Dawn of Day
by sunflower-queen
Summary: He loved her so much, even then, that he'd tried his hardest to hold them together... He'd tried. But in the end, it hadn't mattered. She'd left anyway.
1. Prologue

Thank you so much to addicttwilight2, without whom this story wouldn't have been written.

To say that this prologue is misleading is a huge understatement. Things are about to get angsty, fast, but have a little faith and within time we'll be back to happy, happy times.

Standard disclaimers apply.

-x-x-x-x-

In my sky at twilight you are like a cloud

And your form and colour are the way I love them.

You are mine, mine, woman with sweet lips

And in your life my infinite dreams live.

"In My Sky at Twilight", Pablo Neruda

-x-x-x-x-

**Prologue**

The room was spinning around him in slow, graceful circles. His breathing came in gasps, his chest rising agonisingly slowly with each inhale.

He couldn't quite wrap his head around it. In a few short moments he would become Bella Swan's husband. The entire world would know that she'd chosen him - that she belonged to him, and he to her.

He'd waited for this day for so long, and yet somehow, despite all his months of preparation, he couldn't remember how to perform the simple task of breathing. There was something weighing heavily on his chest, above his heart. Its feathers beat within him, tying his stomach into knots, causing a lump in his throat.

He heard the first low hums of music, and he turned. Dimly he was aware that his sister was walking elegantly down the aisle to the achingly sweet strains of Pachelbel's Canon that floated their way around his family's living room. However, he could only pay attention to the beauty of the atmosphere in small increments. A much larger part of his mind was wholly unconcerned with setting or the presence of other people - the presence of the rest of the world, in fact.

And then Bella entered his plane of sight, and something within him - the hope that had previously been choking him - clenched tightly and relaxed. The soft candlelight illuminating the room only served to pay homage to her utter perfection as she stepped timidly down the aisle, clutching her father's arm.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he was aware that her body was sheathed in a simple silk wedding gown. That her hair, though caught in a long silver pin, still escaped to curl rebelliously around her face. That her breathing was almost as rapid as his and that her knuckles, as she clenched Charlie's arm, were white.

The rest of him had no words. Her dark eyes caught his and held them fiercely. She looked for all the world as if she were about to break into a sprint - as if she wanted nothing more in the world, at that moment, than to be his wife.

Then she was beside him, and her hand grasped his, and the heat of her body inundated him with awe.

This was really happening. She was really here.

The sheer flawlessness of her face and the depth of emotion in her eyes overwhelmed him, filling him up with clogging joy.

Hazily he was aware that his legs were trembling. But that was nothing new, he reflected wryly. He'd always reacted physically to this woman. Always been struck dumb by her vulnerable beauty and unconscious grace. Whether she was wearing a wedding dress or a pair of frayed pyjamas and a towelling robe.

His lips somehow opened, stuttered their vows, and somehow his shaky fingers were smoothing the ring onto hers. He was mesmerised by the simple band of gold. How could such a little thing have so much meaning?

He tore his eyes from her ring to look her full in the face. She smiled tremulously at him, and his heart nearly burst with happiness.

Seconds later he felt a frisson of pure joy as she slid a cool clasp of gold onto his finger. He savoured this moment, the happiest of his long life - his wedding band sliding into position, his wife - wife! - gently squeezing his fingers, and the promise of a whole new life.

She held his eyes, her own shining, as they each waited breathlessly to hear the final confirmation.

"I now pronounce you husband and wife."

It was official. She was his. They were each others.

His mouth opened, the shape of his lips forming a tacit "oh"...

A joyful sob escaped from her throat and suddenly she was in his arms, and kissing him as though they were the only two people in the universe. Her lips pressed against his, again and again, and he couldn't quite make sense of the headiness of this moment. His wife was in his arms, kissing him for the first time.

His arms wrapped around her tightly, his feet nearly leaving the ground, his head squeezing with disbelief. It was over. The uphill struggle, the ever-present fear, the constant effort - it was finished, done. They were husband and wife. Finally, nothing could separate them.

In that second, with their loved ones clapping and cheering around him, proclaiming their marriage to the heavens, he knew that he would never stop loving his wife, that he would never leave her, and that he would never let her go.

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	2. Chapter 1: Ghost

Thanks to addicttwilight2 and to everybody kind enough to leave me reviews.

Standard disclaimers apply.

-x-x-x-x-

On a quiet street where old ghosts meet I see her walking now

Away from me so hurriedly my reason must allow

That I had wooed not as I should a creature made of clay

When the angel woos the clay he'd lose his wings at the dawn of day.

"Raglan Road", Patrick Kavanagh.

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter One: Ghost**

He could pinpoint the exact moment when his marriage keeled over and died.

Like so many other things, it wasn't immediately obvious at the time. They'd had so many moments of tension, and there was no reason for that particular one to stand out from the whole. It was only in retrospect, with many sleepless nights spent soul-searching, that he could see it.

They'd been home, alone for once – his family doing their best to give them some breathing space. Though he'd tried to interest her in everything from watching television to reading to playing poker, she'd refused all joint activities, choosing instead to hammer furiously at the keys of her laptop as if they'd each individually offended her in some way.

A letter to her mother, he'd supposed. Things between them had been somewhat strained lately – her irritability had escalated to the point where she'd snap at him for breathing too loudly, then snap at him again when he ceased breathing completely to please her – yet he'd still thought, somewhat naively, that his wife would not balk at the feeling of his flesh against hers.

He'd been wrong.

He had touched her lightly, intending to get her attention and ask if there was anything she needed. A simple, innocent brush of his hand against her forearm. At his touch, she had flinched and shuddered so violently that he'd been, for a moment, disconcerted.

Her dark eyes had met his, and he'd seen shame and horror and most of all, revulsion in their depths.

"Sorry," she'd muttered, and returned her gaze to the glaring screen of her laptop.

He'd stood still and tried desperately to dam the flood of worry and sickening fear he felt rising up within him. Grimly he had held it back, with all of his strength, and it had worked.

Cautiously and carefully he had retreated to sit in an armchair to watch her, finally moving to a different room entirely when his very presence became somehow offensive.

That night, she's slept and he'd paced, running his hands through his hair, turning time and time again to peruse her sleeping face. And at exactly 4:39 in the morning, his head had cleared and he'd seen right through to the diseased heart of their relationship.

That was it. That was when he'd seen where all of this was going. He'd had that thought; _"We're in big trouble here."_

Though the weeks and months of tension preceding had certainly taken their toll on him, he'd never before entertained the idea that they were in actual trouble. They were stronger than that, surely. It would take a bit more than a few arguments and nights spent in strained silence to break them apart.

Then he'd had that moment of clarity, and though he'd tried to deny it, to shove it back and pretend it didn't exist, the awful knowledge wore a gaping hole in his soul.

Not that the sudden, aching understanding had done him much good. He'd allowed her to erode his self-confidence and dignity till he was little more than a helpless puppy at her feet, and still he had not given up.

He loved her so much, even then, that he'd tried his hardest to hold them together. Tried to talk, and when that hadn't worked, he'd tried to keep his mouth shut. To patiently bear her rebuttals and her undeserved scorn, to put up with her insults and her barely-veiled jibes, poking at his manhood, his family, his former and present life – poking holes into the fabric of his very existence until he was brought to his knees under its weight.

He'd tried. But in the end, it hadn't mattered.

She'd left anyway.

He'd gone on a short trip and when he'd returned, to be greeted with the stale, days-old fragrance of her, he'd found her clothes missing from their usual place in their wardrobe, a circle of dust on the nightstand announcing the absence of her hairbrush, an empty space in the bathroom that had once overflowed with soaps and scented shampoos.

She had vanished, literally disappeared off the face of the earth, and if not for the one-word note she had left behind – a curt _"Sorry"_ – he would have doubted that she'd ever existed at all.

Of course he'd looked for her, tried to follow her. But every lead turned cold, every cunning trick at his disposal failed him, and somehow months had passed.

He'd been able to keep the waves of fatigued anguish and clawing rejection at bay until now. Until the stiff white envelope had flopped, so efficiently, through his mailbox.

Now he could no longer deny the reality of the situation. Now he was left staring at the piece of paper in his hand that assured him, once and for all, that Bella wished to return to her former state of being Isabella Swan. Neat legal phrases cited irreconcilable difficulties, tidied their six-month marriage into a neat box labelled failure.

Her signature, the looping I and graceful S, the definitive line she'd traced from the stem of Swan's n to underline the whole, also served to underline the fact that this was all he had left of her.

He held the paper with a shaking hand, pressing the nib of a pen gingerly against where his name was needed to close their marriage once and for all. And while he waited for his hand to stop shaking, for the world to suddenly fall into recognisable shapes and make everything okay again, he closed his eyes, sank deep into his memories, and dreamed.

-x-x-x-x-

_The heat of the Parisian night wrapped around them both and added a sheen of phosphorescence to her skin that enhanced her beauty, giving it an almost unearthly quality. They stood waiting at a pedestrian intersection. Bella watched the countless waves of cars, motorcycles and bicycles go streaming past, her eyes marvelling. He was content with watching her._

_The streetlights bounced off her hair and reflected in her eyes. The lights of the city added a faint red tint to the brown of her hair as they danced around her, giving her already angelic appearance an even more celestial glow. He was slightly unsure of his own judgement, knowing that his ridiculous love for her made her appear bathed in pools of light and warmth regardless of the atmosphere, but in probing the thoughts around him, he found that he was not the only being in Paris who had noticed her radiance._

_He lifted their entwined hands and brought his lips softly to her knuckles, smiling as her fingers squeezed his in response. She breathed his name in a soft sigh, and he closed his eyes as she laid her head on his shoulder. Ma belle femme, he thought. Ma belle femme. _

_They watched until the little green man at the other end of the walkway glowed, then walked across to stand on a little island in the middle of the Champs-Elysees. He wrapped his arms around her waist and she leant back against him with a quiet sigh of "wow". _

_They regarded the scene quietly, taking silent pleasure from the lights and the trees and the general magic of the evening. There were no words – none were needed. They had become skilled in the art of silent communication. He could divine her thoughts from the slightest twitch in her eyebrow, her feelings in the beat of her heart. For her part, she anticipated his actions and responses in a way that in equal parts thrilled and terrified him, accepting all he had to offer her with a smile and a soft kiss._

_She shifted against him slightly, placed her head nearer his ear._

_"You know, I'm kind of jealous of how much you've travelled," he heard her murmur from her place on his shoulder. "You've been alive so much longer than me. You must have seen a thousand things like this. Out of everywhere, which place in the world is your favourite?" _

_"Why, Mrs. Cullen, I'm surprised at you," he murmured back, unable to keep the lilt out of his voice. "Out of all the questions you could have asked me, you picked the one with the most obvious answer."_

_That piqued her interest. He could almost feel her ears pricking up. Her whole body leaned forward and her head lifted abruptly off his shoulder. Her eyebrows, startlingly dark in the pale of her face, were two sharp points of inquiry. He chuckled quietly to himself. _

_"Well, what is it?" she asked impatiently. _

_His throat swelled with love for her - standing there with the Arc de Triomphe in full glory at her back, just brimming over with curiosity and annoyance at his slowness. How passionate she was. How full of life._

_"Wherever you are," he said softly, watching her through tender eyes. "That's my favourite place."_

-x-x-x-x-

Something annoying was buzzing around his left ear. He blinked, resurfacing unwillingly.

"Edward? Edward?"

"I think he's catatonic." A worried voice. A ridiculous concept. Catatonia would be a welcome release from this fully-conscious hell.

"He's not catatonic, he's just wallowing." A voice full of scorn, trying to erase an undercurrent of worry but not quite succeeding.

A pair of hands gripped his shoulders and shook him lightly.

"Edward, son, look at me. Talk to us, please. You're worrying your mother."

He looked up and met dark eyes, comprehending but not fully understanding. How could Carlisle crouch in front of him looking so worried? Didn't he know? There was no longer anything to worry about. The worst had already happened.

"Carlisle, I cannot see a damn thing." Alice's frustrated voice came from the furthest corner of the room.

He blinked, and suddenly a sensory overload crashed down on his head.

He could hear it all. The restless stirring of six other immortals, worried and impatient within their eternally perfect bodies. The brush of a butterfly's wings that stirred the air in the otherwise still room. The grumbling of a truck as it down-shifted on the highway. And thoughts, always thoughts.

The internal voices of his family swirled murkily in his head.

Esme and Carlisle were literally incoherent with worry. Jasper was frantically trying to place a blanket of peace over him, cursing internally when his every attempt failed. Emmett, his burly brother, who could fit worlds together in his hands, was helpless, impotent, angry. Alice was calculating, scanning the future for any glimpse that would bring him succour. And Rosalie... Rosalie...

In an instant, he had flown from his prone position. In the next moment he had her pinned to the wall by the throat.

"Don't you dare talk about my wife like that," he hissed through clenched teeth.

She regarded him coolly. "Who was talking, brother?" she answered. "You can't keep out of my head, that's your problem."

_She never deserved you... A weak human, bound by the fickleness of her kind... She never really loved you, so why the hell can't you see that this is a GOOD thing? At least you didn't change her, didn't give her ammunition to betray us all... Get over it, Edward, she was just a stupid girl..._

"Shut up!" he roared, releasing her to cram his hands over his ears as though that pitiful action would somehow bring him peace.

He felt his knees give underneath him, and sat on the floor with a thud. This was too much, he thought dizzily. This was why solitude was best, always best. He'd lost the knack of blocking unfriendly thoughts, lost... lost...

...everything.

Swallowing hard, he plunged desperately back into the sea of his perfect memories, trying his hardest to find one that would blot out the concerned voices and worried thoughts of his family.

Bella dancing with her father to Frank Sinatra on their wedding day, her eyes soft with love as she glanced at him over Charlie's shoulder... Bella, clothed in a silky white negligee, swaying her hips gently as the tropical breeze made her hair dance around them... Bella smiling, Bella laughing, Bella kissing him, crying his name at the height of her passion, relaxing in a boneless pool onto his chest to sleep...

Bella's cold, dead eyes regarding him with scorn and distaste. Bella's slow and lethargic movements. Bella pushing him away from her, night after night. Bella locking the door to their bedroom, closing the window so she could sleep alone...

He buried his head in his hands, his shoulders shaking with silent sobs. He could feel his mother's arms around him but could not reciprocate her simple gesture of love. He was broken, shattered. He was nothing.

A glimpse of mahogany hair in front of a large notice board flashing holiday destinations.

That... that wasn't one of his memories.

His head shot up and he stared at his favourite sister.

"Was that her?" he demanded angrily. For the first time in months, a spark of hope ignited in his head as he looked at her.

"I think so," she murmured, her eyes unfocused and foggy. A few tense moments passed.

"Yes," she announced finally. "Yes, it's definitely her. Can you see?"

He could. Through Alice's gift, he saw Bella's brown eyes darting from place to place, her arms wrapped around herself nervously while hordes of chattering people wheeling suitcases passed behind her.

She looked tense, worried, desperate. But it was _her_... the first sight of her he'd obtained in months, and he felt his head lighten in joy and relief.

The airport. She was at the airport and now he knew where she was, he could go to her, beg her, plead with her one more time... He could feel her warmth wrap itself around his body again, could smell the scent of her hair... He was already on his feet, planning.

"Edward," Alice whispered. It seemed, impossibly, as though she had gotten even paler.

He whirled to her in wild excitement. "What is it? Do you see more?" he demanded.

A babble of ancient Italian poetry was his only reply.

He paused, his breath catching in his throat. "Why are you blocking me?" he asked, cold with dread. "What aren't you telling me?"

At the plaintive note in his voice, she slipped. Only for a fraction of a second, but it was enough.

As one in a daze, he watched as Bella's slim, womanly waist was wrapped up in a strong arm. It was only a second, but it was enough. Because he was cursed eternally with a perfect memory, he knew the exact shade of Jacob Black's skin, knew the mole that spotted his loathsome arm just above the elbow, the chipped nails, the calloused hands.

He watched as the arms of the dog wrapped around his wife's soft form, embracing her in a manner which had been denied to him for months.

Alice's sight returned to its former shade of blankness straight afterwards. Which was probably a blessing, because Edward's tenuous grip on sanity was already compromised. Any more would surely have killed him.

As it was, all he could do was sit and wait for the world to make sense again. For Bella to shake him awake and tell him it had all been a horrible nightmare.

He had never lived in 1918. Dracula was just a story made up by a mad Irishman. And in no universe would his wife leave him for a man whom she protested she loved exponentially less than he, Edward.

Sooner or later he would wake up. He just had to stick it out.

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	3. Chapter 2: Monster

Thanks as usual to addicttwilight2. Standard disclaimers continue to apply.

-x-x-x-x-

I had rather be a toad, and live upon the vapour of a dungeon

Than keep a corner in the thing I love for others' uses...

~ "Othello", William Shakespeare, Act III Sc II.

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Two: Monster**

He remembered, now, all too clearly. He saw what he'd missed before. And try as he might to block the hideous images out, still they spooled and replayed in his head on a cursed reel, intent on torturing him.

He should have seen this coming. She'd laid her intentions bare to him before ever she had married him. He had seen the proof with his own eyes, and still refused to believe, refused to contemplate the idea that his own selfish hurt at her betrayal mattered beside the desperate nature of his love for her.

And hurt he had been, though he'd done his best to hide it. How could he not be, listening to their thundering hearts, their gasping breaths? He had witnessed her every reaction to Jacob Black's touch, his kiss, his declaration of love. He had seen fiery blood rush to her cheeks, something that he'd previously been vain enough to believe only happened in his presence. He had sensed her fingers wrapping in his hair, a reaction that he'd previously believed was brought forth by his touch, and his alone.

She'd kissed another man barely twenty-four hours after she'd pledged to be his wife. And still he had ignored the signs of her obvious unhappiness, still he had blindly believed her when she'd told him she had made her choice, that she couldn't live without him. He had swallowed his doubts and his hurt and told himself that everything would work out, everything would be okay. And somehow he'd ended up believing his subterfuge. His and hers.

It had all been a lie, then.

He wondered bitterly to himself whether anything she'd ever told him had been the truth.

Maybe this was his punishment for ever daring to think he could live without her. He'd left her bleeding on a shore of broken promises once before. Maybe this was her long-awaited revenge. Maybe the days and months since their reunion had simply provided her with more fuel to throw on the furnace of her hatred. Maybe she really was that good of an actress, after all.

Even as he poisoned himself with these toxic thoughts, in yet another part of himself he held the memory of their months of bliss dear, replaying certain moments doggedly till every drop of sweetness had been leached out of them.

Bella's mouth wrapping sensuously around the tines of a fork he'd held out for her, Bella's dark eyes smiling at him across a crowded room in a museum, Bella's breathless voice as she moaned her desire into his ear during their most cherished times together, Bella's skin lit softly by the glow of candles and the gentle curl of steam rising slowly from a shared bath.

None of it was real, he reminded himself harshly. How could it have been? She had twisted everything with her eventual retreat, had distorted their happiness into something naive and foolish. Had made his devotion, which he'd once viewed as his duty and privilege as her husband, seem in retrospect to be the desperate pinings of just another teenage boy.

But still his mind could not come any closer to anything that could be construed as an insult to her, to his _wife_, to the woman he still adored. And so he reconsidered. Maybe she'd genuinely tried. Maybe behind the laughter and joy of their honeymoon there had been a kernel of hope she'd cherished. Maybe she, too, had believed that they had a sliver of a chance. After all, it wasn't her fault that her husband was a monster, and it certainly wasn't her fault if through the increased intimacy of their marriage she had come to realise who he really was – what he really was – and had become dissatisfied.

He'd always known that he didn't deserve her. No man was worthy of her so how he'd ever been so arrogant as to think she somehow belonged to him was beyond him.

Still he was trapped in memories, watching their early moments as if studying the interaction between two strangers, remembering his wife in the first days of their relationship and feeling his love for her grow in his chest even as he cursed her memory and wished he'd never laid eyes on her.

Had it been worth it? Was anything worth this pain?

He remembered another time like this, a dark time when his world had collapsed around him with a few simple words. Jacob Black had been the reason for his emotional annihilation then, too, his voice growling into the phone confirming what he'd believed to be his worst nightmare. The solitary hours and days that followed those words – _he's at the funeral_ – had vanished from Edward's head as he'd experienced them. He barely even remembered how he'd gotten to Volterra in the first place, but the gaping chasm his Italian hell had left in his chest was still very much alive and well.

He knew it was a horrible thought and he knew he was a selfish monster for giving voice to it, even in his head, but he would trade this hell for that one in a heartbeat. At least in Italy he had gone to face his demise in the belief that Bella had killed herself because she couldn't bear to live without him. Behind his grief and anguish there had been that little voice that had said wow, she must really have loved you.

He had cursed the knowledge then. Right now he would have done anything for it.

Back then he'd had hope that he could follow her, that the strength of his love would override his sins in the eyes of the god he'd never before believed could be merciful. That somehow they would find their way back to one another. But now... he had no way to fight this now. He was stuck in a horrifying limbo where he could move neither forward nor back. Trapped in the knowledge that the best moments of his life were indubitably over, forced to replay their bittersweet memories in his head and paralysed with stupid, blinding hope that still whispered, maybe this was all a dream...

A blinding awareness flashed into his brain. He realised in horror that in the most selfish recesses of his being, he would have preferred to see her dead than to live in the awareness that she didn't love him anymore.

He clenched his fists so that his nails dug brutally hard into his granite skin, but try as he might he could not chase the sickening thought from his mind. His cursed imagination showed him the broken figure of his dead wife in front of him. He braced himself, waiting for yet another wave of agony to lap at the back of his teeth, and was shocked and disgusted when the thought became just an additional ache in the general torture engulfing his body.

He was a monster, a sick, selfish creature who believed anything would be better than the thought that Bella didn't love him anymore. That she had run from him, straight into the arms of another man. At the mere thought his mind unleashed yet another barrage of images, real and imagined – russet skin pressed tightly against cream and roses, a rough hand bunching in chestnut hair, Jacob Black's mouth embracing his wife's flushed breasts, her voice crying the mongrel's name... Another man worshipping her, loving her, in a way that had previously been reserved for him alone...

A low, guttural moan made its way from his chest and he curled into himself even more, hoping by reducing the amount of physical space he took up he could somehow compress the agony into something manageable.

He felt the warmth of another being wrap tightly around his back to spoon him, felt desperate arms circle his torso and squeeze and smelt the aroma of caramel and violets, but could not react to his mother's fierce embrace. _Where's Bella_, he thought. _I want my wife_.

A hand caught his chin in a tight grip. Dully he allowed whomever it was to force his face up. He registered the fear and torment in his father's eyes as whatever he saw in Edward's face made him hiss in frustration.

"Can't you do anything?" he heard Carlisle bark, and wondered at the harsh tone never before heard in his voice.

"He's not letting me," a voice flavoured with the twang of the South replied in frustration. It became just another one of those things he couldn't care less about.

"I can't believe she did this." A whimper from the far corner of the room. Alice. "I just... I can't believe it."

He heard Rosalie's vicious retort but could not process it. He was drowning in waves of his sister's regret, her horror at this one thing she'd never seen coming, her broken faith in a woman she'd once regarded as her sister and best friend all rolled up into one. Waves of guilt flowed off her and he could sense, and empathise with, Jasper's torment as he felt all that Alice was going through.

Still, he could not bring himself to care. At least Jasper had his mate with him. He could reach out and touch her face. He could hold her and comfort her and soothe her, as Emmett was currently doing for Rosalie. He could stand beside her and suffer along with her as Carlisle and Esme stood, united even in pain.

He, Edward, had no such succour.

Alone. He was eternally alone.

_Bella on her wedding day, her eyes wide behind the lace of her veil. Charlie stood behind her, tears pouring down his cheeks as he stroked his daughter's hair._

_"Are you absolutely sure, Bells?" he asked, his voice rough. _

_Bella turned to smile radiantly at him. "I've never been surer of anything in my life, Dad."_

Edward shuddered, whimpered "Stop it" in Alice's direction, but still his sister continued to play that moment, and others like it, straight into his head.

"There's no way this is real," she announced, her moment of doubt gone, her voice confident once more. "She loves you, Edward. I know she loves you. There has to be something else going on."

But oh, he knew what Alice didn't, he had lived where she hadn't. He had witnessed his wife slipping away from him day by day. Small details – the way she wouldn't look him in the eye anymore – meshed with big ones – how she'd shuddered when he touched her – to form a sick, twisted and entirely realistic view of their short marriage. He believed, still, that Bella had loved him on their wedding day, but he also knew how quickly that had changed.

Humans were fickle, after all. If the past hundred years had taught him nothing, it had taught him that...

Forcing himself out of his jagged memories, he zoned back into his surroundings, and immediately wished he hadn't.

Alice's words had obviously flipped some kind of switch within the immortal minds of his family, because suddenly barrages of images were forcing themselves into his eyes. Some were familiar – Bella tripping, falling, blushing, kissing him, hugging Esme with Elizabeth's ring sparkling on her finger. Others were flipped, as though seen from a mirror, and Edward was affronted with his own cursedly happy image – beaming into Bella's eyes, wrapping his arms around her waist, playing the piano joyously with her sitting by his side.

They were killing him, slowly.

He had just enough self-preservation left in his body to know that he could not do this anymore, could no longer stay in this house where memories of his absent wife and dead marriage swirled around him constantly.

And so, Edward found himself on his feet and accessed the only gift he had left that didn't cause him heartache. He flew out the door as fast as his legs could carry him, the sounds of his family's cries of protest dimming in the air behind him, and let his dead muscles carry him inexorably forward.

He hurtled through the night and didn't stop till he'd reached the outskirts of Seattle. There, he slowed to a walk, and set about the business of tracking.

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	4. Chapter 3: Blood

Thanks to addicttwilight2. Standard disclaimers continue to apply.

-x-x-x-x-

Better never to have met you in my dream than to wake and reach for hands that are not there.

~ Otomo No Yakamochi

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Three: Blood**

The city was full of pregnant women.

In their many and varied forms they waddled though the streets, casting a golden glow of happiness wherever they went, smiling serenely as their fingers stroked their bumps lovingly, back and forth, in an almost unconscious gesture.

Edward couldn't stop looking at them.

Some had wedding rings, some didn't. Some were preoccupied with getting home to their men to receive a much-needed foot rub, some were just concentrating on making it through the next few hours. Some were gloriously round with child, some sported flat bellies but carried their secret with pride all the same, basking in the beautiful mystery of new life.

One thing was universal. The clogging joy that filled them as they mediated on starfish hands and feet and eyes that blinked drowsily, on rosebud lips that tenderly suckled on a breast before stretching in a sated yawn, on the quiet mewls and bubbling laughter of infants.

No matter what other heartache these women were experiencing – be it the acidic feeling of latent morning sickness or the absent space in their lives the child's father should have filled– the elation that overflowed in their thoughts as they thought of their babies was ever-present, untainted.

He knew, logically, that not every woman on the planet was eager to fall pregnant, or glad when it happened. But it was so hard to hold onto that belief when he was faced with this tidal wave of happiness.

He felt sick to his stomach. How could he have so easily dismissed this part of womanhood? How could he have married Bella in the knowledge that she could never feel this way, could never experience the unequivocal magic of carrying a child within her body, holding her baby in her arms?

For the first time, he could contemplate Black's presence in her life with something other than blind fury. Looking at it from a purely academic point of view, he could understand how she would want him – want what he could give her out of life. Want to be able to touch her lover without fear, want to go to bed with him and wake up with him every morning, want to...

Want to carry his child...

Maybe that's why she had left him. Maybe she had fallen pregnant by Black and had known that she could no longer continue with the double life she'd so obviously been living.

He wrenched himself violently from his cursed thoughts. This was exactly why he'd failed last time, he told himself angrily. He'd been so consumed by the torture of not being with Bella that he had allowed Victoria to create opportunities that never should have been present, to slip through his grasp like quicksilver. And it had almost led to disaster.

He'd almost lost her then.

He was without her now. And dammit, but he just wanted to find her again. To see her, talk to her, smell her hair. Most of all just to understand _why_.

He closed his eyes now, focused on releasing all scents but two from his mind.

Underneath the dust and soot and pollution of the city, under the different shades of human blood that tingled delectably in his nostrils, he detected a faint, but very definitely familiar scent. He wrinkled his nose. Decaying organic material mixed with the scent of animal waste and a hint of – there was no other way to say it – _wet dog_ assaulted his senses, making him hiss quietly as he registered the presence of an enemy. And yes, underneath the overpowering stench, a faint hint of freesia and strawberries sang to him.

Closing his eyes, he concentrated fully on the odours. His feet pulled him almost mechanically, his entire body straining around every corner, sure that he would soon see his wife, would soon know if she loved him, if she'd ever loved him, or if she truly wanted Jacob Black now.

He made his way through the city blindly. With his cursed vampiric memory and enhanced senses it was nearly impossible for him to walk in circles and yet somehow that felt like exactly what he was doing.

He gritted his teeth and tried again, seeking a new angle, a new side street. He found an alley where the faint traces of the dog's stench grew exponentially, but all markers disappeared straight afterwards.

He growled in anger. The smog and pollution of the city had stolen his wife's delicate fragrance from him. It was a dead end.

Turning, he unleashed his frustration onto the nearest object he could see – a large dumpster. The metal groaned as his fist punched straight through it. The unleashing of his feelings felt good, but only for a moment, after which he was doused in shame for not being able to control himself better. This unrestrained, feral creature was what Bella Swan had pledged her life to.

He inhaled sharply in grief, then froze.

There was a human standing at the end of the alley, staring at him, and now walking towards him.

Whoever it was, man or woman, he didn't care. He could feel a barrage of thoughts invading his subconscious but he heard none of them. The person could have been a saint or a murderer, it would not have mattered.

The only thing in his mind was that he was a predator, he was thirsty, and this human was too close to him, much too close.

He held his breath, longing for relief, for rationality, but found only raging need. His mouth pooled with venom.

"Are you okay? I heard something crash..." A musical, lilting voice. So, this person was a woman, then...

Of course the call of her blood did not hold even one-tenth the power over him that Bella's once had. But it was something, something hot and wet in his mouth, something to fill the aching hole inside him, something to bring him an ounce of satisfaction, of peace...

His eyes raked over her form, calculating, and he froze as he noticed long dark hair clinging gently to the nape of her neck. Her eyes were blue and intent as they looked into his.

He drew a deep breath, and felt flames scorch his throat with a black, dead heat. And still this woman, this vessel of hot, rich, sweet human blood... drew ever nearer.

There was a floral undertone to her blood, the earthy concentrated musk of lavender rather than the softer fragrance of freesia he so longed for. Even so, the scent was enough like Bella's that he froze in disbelief, sure for a moment that it was his wife wrapped up in a cunning disguise.

Everything suddenly just crashed in on itself, all his hurt, all his pain, all his longing. He crumpled, his body jack-knifing as he wrapped his arms around himself and sobbed, tearlessly, in the dirt of the alley.

"It's okay," the woman's voice murmured soothingly in his ear, and still he sobbed, shaking his head. Nothing was okay, nothing would ever be okay again. This woman and her lack of self-preservation and her ridiculous compassion at the distress of a man lurking in an alley were swirling reality around him again, so that when he looked up at her, he saw brown eyes where there should have been blue and imagined pale skin where there was tan.

"I'm sorry," he mouthed, and was amazed when the words actually seemed to make sense to her. He watched her lips as they moved, hearing but not understanding the sounds that bubbled out, and for a moment he could see the shadow of his wife's rosy mouth on this stranger's face so clearly that he swayed forward to steal a kiss.

The woman recoiled, her body freezing. That tiny, insignificant action, which would have barely been noticed by anyone, was his undoing. His and hers.

"_Get away from me," Bella screamed. "Don't touch me. You're a monster. I don't want you. I'm tired, okay? I'm so tired!"_

His eyes blackened. Fear and pain twisted in his gut. Somehow they formed a potent rage that tormented the beast inside, dancing around it, taunting it.

The woman's dark hair served as just enough similarity for his crazed mind. Never again would his wife flinch away from him.

Faster than the nameless human woman could understand, he shot up from the ground, bending her backwards, baring her neck.

He bit. And he drank.

Hot. Wet. Beautifully sweet in his mouth. He was a dying man in the desert and her blood soothed his thirst as it poured down his throat.

Her hands fisted in his hair, tugged desperately. He growled, remembering a time when that simple action had meant so much more than this. When it had been an unrestrained and passionate response to his kiss, rather than the desperate struggle of a dying animal. But it would all be okay, soon. His wife was here now, and he was making her eternal.

"_You're ready now, then?" he whispered, his teeth an inch from her neck._

"_Yes," she murmured back, her soft doe eyes looking deep into his._

The image hit him squarely in the centre of his chest – not just the physical picture, but the feeling it inspired. Bella in his arms, vowing to be his eternal partner, his everything...

"_She's gone, Edward." Alice's voice was grim. "She's gone. It's over. I am... so sorry."_

He froze in the act of drinking.

He was struck through with fear.

His wife. His wife... had left him. She was... wasn't here.

She wasn't here, and in the selfish need to grab her imagined form and never let it go, he was killing an innocent woman.

Edward recoiled viciously from the prone figure of his victim.

He raised a shaking hand to his mouth, disbelieving of his actions until he drew it back and saw it covered in blood.

He could hear them now – the thoughts of his prey. Her entire being was curling up under the fire of his venom, and still her mind lingered on the love she felt for the two small sons she'd left in the company of her treasured husband, the dawning knowledge and bitter regret that she would never see them again, her mind struggling to come to terms with the fact that her altruistic gesture had ended in this bloodbath...

He had taken this woman from her family, just as he'd wrenched Bella from hers. He had denied her the chance of watching her children grow, just as he'd attempted to do with Bella. He had... had...

If it could have been possible, in that moment, for him to vomit, he would have done so. The urge to undo what he had done, to pour this woman's life back into her body, to rewind time and freeze his actions, would have ensured that reflex.

But as he looked at her writhing form, he knew, with bitterly sane certainty, that there was only one way to end this. This woman did not deserve to be damned to the life he cursed daily, should not be subjected to this eternal hell, should not have to watch her sons grow and die from a distance, longing to touch them and yet unable to.

On more practical terms, he knew he was in no condition to properly train and counsel a newborn vampire who would understandably loathe the mere sight of him, and unleashing a bloodthirsty monster on the streets of Seattle would result in even more innocent deaths.

And so, the bitterness of his regret thick in the back of his throat, he reached down to the terrified human and placed his hands tenderly on the sides of her neck.

"I am so very sorry," he whispered in torment, then flexed his fingers gently, wincing as he heard the vertebrae snap.

The woman's body went limp and her eyes stared lifelessly into his own. And he could feel – could quite literally _feel_ – whatever vestiges of soul Bella had returned to him flee his cursed, murderous body.

Then he was standing, moving, striding away from the woman whose blood he had drank and whose body he had mauled, away from the whole ugly mess he'd created. Moving quickly enough to be invisible to the naked eye, as if by dint of speed alone he could outrun what he'd caused.

He had no idea where he was going or what he would do once he got there. But he was moving, at least. That was good.

He'd find somewhere isolated, somewhere out of the way, where he couldn't hurt himself or anybody else. And he'd wait for things to make sense again.

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	5. Chapter 4: Heart

Thanks to addicttwilight2. Standard disclaimers still apply.

-x-x-x-x-

I know what my heart is like  
Since your love died:  
It is like a hollow ledge  
Holding a little pool  
Left there by the tide,  
A little tepid pool,  
Drying inward from the edge.

~ "Ebb", Edna St. Vincent Millay.

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Four: Heart**

He couldn't quantify the amount of time he spent locked away inside himself. It could have been minutes, days, years. Huddling in the dark dankness of a little-used cellar, he wrapped his arms around his knees and rocked back and forth slowly, slipping into the peaceful fog of his subconscious, his memories of a happier time.

"_I love you more than anything," Bella murmured softly between kisses. He stroked the hair back from her eyes gently, revelling at the sensation of holding his naked wife in his arms, rejoicing at there being absolutely nothing between them._

"_You're all I want. All I need. Everything," he said simply, and watched as her eyes misted, her small body unable to contain the force of her love._

_She planted a small butterfly kiss on his exposed collarbone, her tongue snaking out to grace his skin with warmth. He could do nothing but lie there and grasp at his control with shaking hands as her tiny frame moved on top of him, worshipping him, loving him. The position felt so backward, so wrong, but his will crumbled to dust under the gentle touch of her hands, the look of utter devotion in her eyes._

_He grasped her under her armpits gently, hauling her from where her mouth had been meandering lazily around his navel, and kissed her. He tried to pour as much of himself as possible into the simple, almost chaste contact, trying to communicate without words how much he wanted her, needed her, couldn't live without her._

_He knew she felt it too. She accepted him utterly, wholly, returned his greedy kisses, sated his desperate need, accepted all he had to offer her and in return allowed him the greatest sanctity he had ever known, would ever know. Their bodies moved together in perfect synchrony, and he had the thought, as his hands smoothed around the gentle curve of her waist, that she had been crafted, body and mind, especially for him._

And then, somehow, the perfect image of his wife trembling in his arms faded and dissolved, and he was left gasping, grasping desperately for the peace the memory had brought him.

"Come back," he muttered to himself, not caring that this declaration would surely serve as definitive proof to any outsider that his mind had finally snapped.

Gritting his teeth he concentrated hard, straining for the escape this could give him.

_Bella surveying her naked body in the mirror of their Parisian suite, her gaze focused on the penny-shaped bruises on her hips._

"_Oh please. This could have happened with a human," she scoffed, throwing him a smile over her shoulder. "This is nothing, Edward. It doesn't even hurt. I promise."_

_She walked back to him, her hips swaying, her arms reaching for him..._

The image fizzled out again. He almost groaned aloud in frustration. He _knew_, so clearly, what had happened next, knew the feelings that had inundated him, the words that they'd gasped to each other at their greatest moments of vulnerability, and yet he could not lose himself in the memories. It felt as though he were watching a film rather than reliving moments of his life. Watching a film and finding it hard to believe that any man could ever have been that lucky.

He could almost feel beads of sweat pooling on his forehead as he battled with his stubborn brain, fighting to experience even the merest shadow of the bliss she'd inspired within him...

_Bella smiling at him weakly around the hard plastic of an oxygen mask. _

"No, stop it," he whispered, too low for anyone to hear.

_Bella, bleeding on his kitchen table, his father's hands working diligently to staunch her wounds._

He swallowed harshly, expecting tears to prick at the corner of his eyes for maybe the millionth time since he'd been changed.

_Bella's hands clutching at his hair, not in passion but in fear, trying to pull his teeth from her flesh. _

His mouth went dry. "No," he whispered, horrified.

_Bella's eyes as they swam with unbearable pain, Bella's small frame as it writhed in agony, Bella's mind as it shrieked at the knowledge that she was about to lose everything..._

"No, that wasn't her," he moaned, clutching at his hair, trying with desperation to quell the next image that swam before him.

_Bella's eyes as they stared dully towards a sky they would never see again. Bella's neck, twisted at an odd angle. Bella's broken and mangled body._

"It wasn't her!" he cried aloud, his arms wrapping around his midsection. "It wasn't her, she's alive, she's okay, it wasn't her!"

_It was somebody's Bella._

He buried his face in his hands and sobbed brokenly.

-x-x-x-x-

The next thing he was aware of was the uncomfortable sensation of water, seeping slowly through his clothes.

Vampires did not feel cold, did not feel discomfort, of course. But the unwelcome and unfathomable feeling was enough to make him blink once, twice, and look dully down at himself.

As one in a daze, he watched as a tiny hand descended towards his face quickly, barely registering the sharp sting that came with Alice using all her strength to slap him.

"Edward, stop being such a stubborn asshole!" she shrieked, catching him by the lapels of his shirt, shaking him. He could only stare witlessly at her.

The conscious mind, whether human or immortal, was capable of experiencing infinite thoughts and experiences at the exact same time. There were the primary, mundane thoughts, of course – _wonder what's for dinner, can't wait for the game tonight, is that goddamned driver ever going to cancel his signal light _– but at the back of it all a thousand other concerns clamoured for attention. From the ever-present worry about a sick child to the minor, often unconscious, annoyance of an itchy label at the back of a shirt.

As a direct consequence of his gift, Edward had become skilful at sifting through the meaningless debris to pluck out the kernel of information useful to him. But at that moment, as he looked into his sister's face, all he could feel was her inexplicable anger. He did not sense the worry or fear behind it and did not care about the forces driving it.

"I'm sorry," he said listlessly, curling himself into a tighter ball.

"Don't be sorry, for Christ's sake," Alice exploded. "Just listen to me for once in your life, will you?"

He blinked, tried to focus, stared blearily up at her.

"What is it?" he asked, doing his best to feign interest.

"I've been talking to Jasper, and..."

Jasper. Of course it was about her mate. He tuned her out again, the melodic bells in her voice blending seamlessly to white noise.

She slapped him again. "I said listen to me, Edward! This is important!"

He swallowed. "Cut to the chase, Alice, my concentration span isn't what it used to be," he whispered. Even to him, his voice sounded like the flapping of dead leaves.

"Fine, then," she snapped, "let's talk about something that's always gotten your attention. BELLA, Edward."

He winced. "Stop it."

She caught him by the wrists, forced his hands down and away from his face.

"Bella," she said forcefully, angrily. "I need to talk to you about Bella."

He couldn't muster up the strength to argue. "What about her?"

"When, exactly, did everything go sour between you?"

He winced again, and for the first time the shadow of contrition fell over Alice's face.

"I'm sorry," she said hurriedly, and he could tell she meant it. "I know that this is hard for you. I know it is. But I wouldn't be asking if it wasn't important."

"Why is it important?" he asked drearily.

"Never mind that. Just answer the damned question." Her eyes were fierce and intent upon his. Unwillingly, he thought for a few minutes.

"Do you remember that hunting trip we took to Juneau?" he asked finally. At her nod, he continued. "It was after that. After we'd gotten back. I went home and... things were different."

Alice didn't miss a beat. "Different how?"

It was testament to how far he'd disintegrated that he didn't even hesitate in sharing the details of what had once been his life with his sister.

"She didn't want to make love," he said, and swallowed hard. "Any separation for us back then used to be... painful."

_Bella's voice murmuring softly in his darkened bedroom. "I missed you..."_

"She pushed me away," he said, his voice hiccupping slightly. "She used to sleep all huddled into my chest, like a kitten. That night she slept facing away from me. And whenever I touched her after that... she shivered."

Alice nodded, her face composed, her voice thoughtful. "This was what – two weeks after you two got back from Paris?"

_Bella's hair flapping around them wildly as they stood at the topmost platform of the Eiffel Tower, looking out at the city. She turned to him, smiling brilliantly._

"_Would you catch me if I fell?" she asked, her voice teasing._

_His reply was instantaneous. "Always."_

He pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. "Something like that."

He was suddenly irrationally furious with his little sister for making him relive all of this pain.

"You shouldn't be here," he said, his voice measured but warning.

She stood her ground, her tiny arms crossed across her chest. "I'm here to help you, Edward. To bring you home."

"_Wherever you are..."_

"I have no home," he told her lifelessly. "Not anymore."

Alice opened her mouth to retaliate, but he beat her to it.

"Did you see it?" he demanded. "Did you see this coming?"

Her face went blank. "You know I didn't," she whispered, her voice full of dread. "I thought there was something wrong between you, but if I'd thought for a second..."

He turned his face from her. "Forget it," he said bitterly. "It's not like you knowing would have changed anything."

When she spoke again, her voice was tight. "It wasn't just you she left, you know. It wasn't just you she withdrew from. She did it to all of us."

"Do you know that I killed a woman today?" he asked his knees. "I drank her blood, snapped her neck and left her to rot in a trash-filled alley. Did you see _that_ happening, little sister?"

"Yes," she said gravely.

He looked up at her. "Then why come here?" he asked bitterly. "Why ask all these questions, dredge all of this back up? You see what I've become. What I've always been. What we all are. Can you really blame her for leaving?"

Alice's face was hard. "Yes. And no."

He rested his forehead on his knees. "I can't talk to you about this, Alice," he said tiredly. "Please, just go away."

She moved to kneel beside him. One of her hands came forward to clasp his.

"What if I said you could stop being such a masochist, Edward?" she asked, her voice very quiet. "What if I told you that I knew the exact reason why Bella left?"

"I know why she left already. She finally realised what we are. What I am. What she married."

He could feel air moving around Alice's head as she shook it.

"That's utter crap and you know it. You know that Bella loved you. Loves you. Hasn't she proved it often enough? What does it take for you to believe it, Edward?"

He lifted his head to stare at her. She stared right back at him.

"What does it take for you to accept that it's over?" he whispered incredulously. "Were the divorce papers not enough? What about the mutt? Was the fact that Bella was with Jacob Black, the only other man she's ever loved, not proof enough for you? What'll it take, Alice? If you see _them_ getting married, then will you give up this stupid illusion that Bella was ever meant to be your sister?"

Her face was hard. "Never, Edward."

He shook his head in disbelief. "What possible rationale..."

"Will you shut up for just one second?" She interrupted him angrily, and for the first time he detected something beside her mask of anger and pain, some purpose behind questions that had previously seemed utterly pointless.

_A room with whitewashed walls, an iron-wrought bed, a flash of porcelain skin..._

"What was that?" he asked sharply, his senses suddenly on hyper-alert. "Have you seen something else, Alice? Tell me!"

She took a deep breath, her hand on his suddenly squeezing.

"Yes, I have. And I think it could – I think it could explain everything. I don't understand it all, not yet," she said dourly, a pucker forming between her eyebrows. "But I think... Edward, I think it's a good thing... you just have to promise not to freak out."

"Anything, anything," he said hurriedly, his entire being straining, despite itself, for another glimpse of his wife.

Alice looked him straight in the eyes.

"It's definitely Bella," she promised grimly. "And... Edward..."

Without further ado or preamble, he was plunged straight into her vision. It was only a flash, but still it inspired a coiling fear within him that made him cry out with terror.

_Bella's slender form writhing on a bed, her spine arching, fingers and toes stretched to breaking point as she screamed. "Edward, Edward, Edward..."_

Then Alice's voice, full of trepidation, confirming what he already knew.

"I think she's... changing."

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	6. Chapter 5: Alone

Thank you addicttwilight2. Standard disclaimers still apply.

-x-x-x-x-

I thought of you and how you love this beauty,  
And walking up the long beach all alone  
I heard the waves breaking in measured thunder  
As you and I once heard their monotone.

Around me were the echoing dunes, beyond me  
The cold and sparkling silver of the sea,  
We two will pass through death and ages lengthen  
Before you hear that sound again with me.

"I Thought Of You," Sara Teasdale

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Five: Alone**

She'd known the exact moment when her marriage had keeled over and died.

He had left her for the first time since they'd become man and wife. A hunting trip in Alaska with his family. They had both realised how necessary it was but still, the separation had been painful. She'd put on a brave face and literally kicked him out of the house, wondering absently how she was ever going to get to sleep without the soft sound of his breathing beside her. Little had she known that soon even that simple comfort would be taken from her forever.

It had happened then. She'd received a note, a few lines written on a piece of paper, and with that, her marriage had tumbled around her ears. Everything had flipped on its head, had been laid out in stark and simple terms, and she had seen right through to the diseased heart of her and Edward.

She'd realised then that she would have to leave him. That they couldn't continue living this lie, this mockery of a marriage. She hated herself for it, yet somehow she felt she deserved to be miserable for ever thinking she was allowed to be that happy. Of course it was wrong, of course it had to end. Of course.

She wasn't the person she'd once thought she was. Neither was he. The steps she had taken to create and then widen a gulf between them had worked all too well, had turned them into two strangers that barely knew how to function around each other. The house had not been big enough to contain the damage she had inflicted on both of them.

And then... then there was Jacob.

Swivelling in the small booth, she eyed the tall form of her best friend as he chatted blithely with the pretty waitress, charming her into offering him more pie. His tone was easy, friendly, his expression disarming, but she who knew him so well could spot the signs of fatigue and stress on his massive frame with ease.

Sometimes, lying next to him on the stained mattress of whatever run-down motel they'd collapsed at after a long day of travelling, she watched him sleeping and bitterly regretted ever having met him. She'd known, of course, that she needed him – that there was no way to avoid being with him, not anymore – but still she wished that she could have been strong enough to do this on her own.

She loved him, and still she'd chosen to involve him in the sticky mess of her dead marriage. In the end, she had been too selfish to allow him a Bella-free existence. That very first day she had run blindly into his arms, and he'd been a solid refuge for her, keeping her close and safe, making her feel as protected as she could in the circumstances.

She'd known he paid a huge price by doing this for her, but he was such a pure and good person that he hadn't hesitated even once when she'd shown up howling at his door. His clear mind saw things simply, even when they weren't. No matter what, friends were friends, family was family and he would do whatever it took to protect her and keep her safe. He'd helped her plot, helped her scheme and machinate, and had finally been there to hoist her on the back of his motorcycle and screech into the night.

Now as they drove across the country, stopping only in quiet restaurants and sleepy motels, he orbited around her like a satellite. She knew, of course, that touch wasn't necessary to foil her former sister-in-law's gift, but still she felt insecure unless some part of him was pressed against some part of her, and he felt that insecurity and acted accordingly. When he drove, she rested her head in the hollow between his shoulder blades. When they ate, she rested her boot-clad foot atop his. When they slept, he curled his large body around hers like a question mark. And when they walked, he kept an arm coiled loosely about her waist.

And if she longed, constantly, for a colder touch, for a tender white hand to graze her face in moments of silence, for icy lips to flutter about the hollow of her throat each morning as she woke... well... that was her problem. Residual feelings for a love that had died months before. What good was love anyway, she thought bitterly. Instead of bringing them closer together, it had just torn them apart. He'd loved her, but not enough to change her, to make them equals. She'd loved him, but not enough to trust him in the end.

A large hand squeezing hers broke her out of her reverie.

"Hey," he murmured softly, "are you okay? You seemed a bit lost for a minute there."

She blinked twice. She hadn't even noticed him folding his long frame into the seat beside her.

She offered him a weak smile. "I'll get over it."

He nodded, his eyes pained but understanding. She watched him quietly.

"Have to say, I've never travelled this far before," he said, grinning at her. "Kansas is a lot... flatter than I expected."

The corner of her mouth quirked up. "Thank you for doing this," she whispered under her breath, knowing he could still hear her.

Mockingly, he checked his wristwatch. "Wow, it's been two hours since the last time you said that. I think that's a record, Bells. Your average is improving."

She shook her head, a wry smile twisting at her lips. "I can't ever say it enough."

He offered her a single shrug of his massive shoulders. "You're my family. What else could I do?"

"But Leah..."

His eyes darkened briefly, shot through with pain as he remembered her, the woman he had at last fallen in love with.

He swallowed. "Leah understands too. Believe it or not."

She stared at her hands, clasped together on the dirty Formica table. "I just hate that I've taken you away from her. Again."

"She knows you're important to me. She knows you're my family. Of course it's hard for us both, but she gets it. She really does. She would do the same, if Seth needed her."

She nodded twice, swallowing a large lump in her throat. She couldn't express all she felt in words and so she squeezed his hand, hard, and hoped he understood.

His eyes got slightly misty. He cleared his throat.

"Bella, I think it's time."

She blinked. "Time for what?"

"To make our way towards an airport."

Her breath caught in her throat, which suddenly felt extremely constricted.

He noted her alarm and continued. "It's been two weeks. If anybody was going to follow us they'd have done so by now."

Her fists clenched as she tried to control her rising panic.

He reached out and laid his hand on her cheek. "You knew it had to happen sooner or later," he said gently.

Tears pricked the corners of her eyes. "I know," she muttered, staring fixedly at her hands. "I just... I don't want this, I never wanted this."

"I know."

No further words were spoken. His thumb stroked gently and rhythmically over her cheekbone.

Finally she managed to quell her emotions, compacting them into a tight lump of insanity and locking them tightly in the back of her mind. She breathed slowly and evenly and eventually felt well enough to square her shoulders, look up at him and nod firmly.

They left together. She didn't look back.

-x-x-x-x-

"_Bella, please tell me what you're thinking. Please let me in. This is killing me."_

_Her back was to him, every muscle locked and tight. _

"_There's nothing to say." Her expressionless voice rang in her ears._

"_There's everything to say, Bella! Why won't you look at me? Why won't you talk to me? What have I done that's so awful? Please, Bella, if you don't tell me what the problem is, I can't do anything to fix it."_

_She ignored him. A few moments of silence passed between them, and then suddenly he was facing her, his eyes fierce, his hands demanding. _

"_You're my wife, goddammit! Act like it!" And he kissed her, his mouth firm and unyielding against hers. _

_Though it felt like it would kill her, she forced her body to remain stiff, her lips closed tightly. Beneath the blankets her knuckles were straining against her skin._

_His tongue flickered insistently against her lips. She forced herself to remain impassive. One of his hands wrapped itself around the side of her face, the other clutching at her hair feverishly, and still she did not move. The kiss felt like what it was, a dead thing._

_He was growing angry, frustrated. She could feel it in every subtle way that his body twined with hers, in every shift of his weight against her, in the desperate way he was kissing her. His body was pleading with hers for affirmation, for some acceptance or acknowledgement of this closeness they'd once shared so easily._

_He flipped over, onto his back, holding her above him. His present actions were unhinged when compared with his normal, implacable behaviour, and yet his hands still cradled her like the most precious of porcelain figurines. With one hand tight around her back to prevent her from moving, he held her face above his and layered kisses down her throat, his tongue darting out to tease her skin. Her breathing was loud and ragged in her ears._

_Then the world was whirling again and she was beneath him, and he was everywhere. Perhaps sensing her lack of control, his hands were eager now as they inched their way beneath her loose top, grazing the skin of her belly tenderly before cupping her breasts in his hands._

_In another heartbeat, the fabric of her top had disappeared, her skin was open to the night air and his mouth was paying homage to her right breast. _

_She closed her eyes and for a moment thought to arch her back, to bring her traitorous flesh even closer to his lips. _

_Then sanity flooded back in. She panicked and pulled at his hair._

_He drew back slightly, his face open and vulnerable, his eyes soft and yet still somehow pleading._

"_I said no," she said flatly. "What, does it only matter when you say it?"_

_He drew a sharp, shocked breath. She took the moment to place her hand on his shoulder and push. When he'd rolled off her fully, she turned her back to him, curled her knees up to her chest and reached to the nightstand for the pills she had so recently purchased._

_She swallowed one thickly and let the fog of artificial sleep overwhelm her. Hearing but refusing to acknowledge his shuddering, sobbing breaths at her back._

-x-x-x-x-

"Bella! Bella, wake up!"

Her eyes opened and for a moment she saw golden eyes where there was brown, her husband where there was her best friend, the chance for redemption where there was none.

She couldn't help it. She threw her arms around him, buried her face in his neck, and sobbed her eyes out.

His large hand stroked her hair rhythmically. His voice was a tender murmur in her ear.

"It's okay, it's okay. I'm here, I'll never let anything happen to you, it's all going to be okay..."

"I miss him so much," she choked. "I miss what we used to be. I just wish..."

"I know." His voice held an ancient grief and she knew that he really did get it, that he understood more than words could say.

They lay there together on the narrow motel bed, each wishing they were somewhere else, with someone else. Bella had the feeling that they were the last two people in the entire universe, marooned in this narrow slice of hell, clinging to each other desperately for any drop of comfort that could come from human contact.

Somewhere as the grey limpness of dawn crept ever nearer, she drifted into an uneasy sleep, dancing visions of her estranged husband just out of reach.

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	7. Chapter 6: Echo

Thank you addicttwilight2. Standard disclaimers apply.

-x-x-x-x-

Come back to me in dreams, that I may give

Pulse for pulse, breath for breath:

Speak low, lean low,

As long ago, my love, how long ago.

"Echo", Christina Rossetti

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Six: Echo**

It had happened so easily, so quietly. One minute, she was staring blankly at her pale reflection in the mirror of yet another anonymous airplane bathroom. The next, she became aware of her hair sticking sweatily between her collarbones, and irritably yanked on it. The fragile gold chain that had somehow made its way out from its unobtrusive place under her bulky sweater and wound itself in her hair snapped, and seconds later she was listening in horror to the delicate tinkling of gold on tile.

She fell to her hands and knees in a panic, desperately searching. Her engagement ring was located easily enough – its cluster of diamonds waved merrily at her from a dark corner – but her wedding band was another story. Her breath escaping from her lungs in sobs, she searched the tiled floor like a blind creature, her hands patting and patting until she finally discovered it hidden under a bunch of damp tissue paper.

She grasped it feverishly in her hot hand and just like that, her fingers were holding the rings, ramming them back into position. For a moment she clutched at the cool clasps of gold, twiddling the bands around her finger in a long-forgotten habit, before staring down at her hand in dumb realisation.

Sick to her stomach, she tugged and tugged at the now meaningless rings. The skin below her knuckle had become dough-like, pasty and engorged from the absence of jewellery. She hurt herself in her efforts to get the damn things off, but stubbornly they clung to her flesh.

_Soap_, she thought, _I need soap_, and staggered to the sink. Vigorously she scrubbed at her hand under a stream of water, fighting with the symbols of her marriage until finally they succumbed to the laws of physics and slid smoothly from her hand. They clattered onto the cold marble of the sink, the tinny sound much too small to contain the gravity of that moment.

She stared at it, feeling bile rise in the back of her throat. The last time this had happened... the last time she'd taken those rings off...

Angrily she tried to force the memory back into the recesses of her brain, but it poked and prodded at her until she was forced to let it go.

She'd needed soap then, too. Standing in their ridiculously large bathroom, she'd stared down at these exact rings and reflected that before that day, they had not left her finger since Edward had placed them there.

She'd crumbled where she stood. The bright lies she'd built so carefully around herself – _it won't hurt for long, he'll be okay, you'll get over_ it – had tumbled down around her and she'd folded into herself like a ragdoll, her arms clenched around her stomach. Somehow she'd staggered into the shower, feeling scalding pinpricks of water assault her tender body, and her grief had emerged from her throat in great, gulping howls.

Even now, two months and two continents away, she had to choke back a sob at the memory of that pain.

"_Bella?" His voice was pained. "Bella, can I come in?"_

She banged her head softly off the cool sink, hoping to shoot the memory out of her head on a wave of physical pain. It was no use. Still she heard the gentle creak of the door as if it were still actually happening, felt the gush of cold air as he opened the shower, shuddered in relief as his cool body wrapped around her back, enfolding her in a tight embrace.

Her eyes closed tightly as she remembered how she'd tried to struggle, tried to fight against this achingly sweet gesture. She'd wondered how it was that after all of her rebuttals, all of her lies and reprimands and outright screaming accusations, he still cared this much. Somehow his utter devotion to her had made her hate and love him in equal measures –maybe hate him because moments like this made her fall in love with him all over again – and she had fought like a wildcat, biting, scratching, kicking every inch of skin she could reach.

She'd shrieked at him, she remembered with a wince, calling him every name she could think of, the shrew-like shrilling of her voice amplified in the enclosed space. Still he had held grimly on and eventually her movements had turned feeble, her insults somewhat less than venomous. Finally she'd tilted her head back to find his shoulder and sob agonisingly into his neck.

She heard his voice whispering into her ear, telling her sweet little lies. _"It's all right, it's all right. We can work this out, love. It'll be okay. This is just... just a rough patch, everything will be fine, we'll be happy... I promise you, I am going to make you so happy..."_

It had worked, too. Her tears had ebbed, she had relaxed. She'd slumped back against him, weary of trying to deny her connection to him, her head lolling back on his shoulder, her breaths hiccupping weakly into her lungs.

He'd kissed her forehead. _"I was wondering when that was going to happen."_

She had opened her eyes and found his. She could see individual droplets of water clinging to his lashes, warm gold moving over her face like another embrace. She'd realised then that this was the closest they'd been since the day after their honeymoon...

She opened her eyes, startled by the potency of her memory. Artificial light stabbed her retinas. She gritted her teeth, manoeuvred her foot out of her sandal, and kicked the side of the ceramic sink. Hard.

Biting back a moan, she felt momentarily victorious. The physicality of the action had successfully distracted her from what had happened next on that particular occasion. How she'd given up trying to hate him, how she'd thrown caution to the wind, how she'd kissed him, held him, made love to him, told him how much he meant to her... how she'd gotten up the next morning to find a rose on the pillow, how she'd left that afternoon as he was out hunting.

She kicked the sink again, and again, tears beading in her eyes as blood throbbed in her toes.

A soft, accented voice behind her. "Excusez-moi?"

She gasped and spun around, her hand flying to her chest. There in front of her stood an old lady, regarding Bella with fear in her eyes. The woman's hands were held out – she was obviously en route to the sink Bella had been abusing.

"I'm so sorry." Her voice was husky from lack of use. She cleared her throat awkwardly, slipping her foot back into her sandal. Desperately she scrabbled for the French she'd learned in evening classes with Renee, light years ago. "Je m'excuse. Je suis tres desolée."

The lady nodded cautiously, moving past Bella to immerse her hands in the still-running water. Bella turned on her heel to exit the bathroom.

"Attendez, mademoiselle," the woman croaked.

Bella swung back to find a wrinkled hand held out to her. There in the centre of the wizened palm sat her engagement and wedding rings.

She sucked in a breath, her fingers lightly grazing papery-thin skin as she retrieved the jewellery. She looked into the woman's watery blue eyes and tried her best to give a genuine smile.

"Merci beaucoup," she said quietly, jamming the rings into her jean pocket.

Seconds later she was out in the dimly-lit corridor, leaning against the grubby wall, her eyes closed and her head tilted back as she tried to regain some hint of dignity. Her hand was coiled in a fist around the rings in her pocket.

Tendrils of warmth reached out and embraced her. She knew, without looking, that Jacob was standing in front of her, his eyes scanning her face worriedly.

His voice was sympathetic. "Stressed, Bells?"

She nodded curtly once, not bothering to open her eyes.

"I know the feeling. Pardon me for being an uncultured slob, but this language barrier crap is freaking me out. I keep thinking everybody we pass is talking about us."

"They're not. We're unobtrusive." She hated that her paranoia had rubbed off so obviously on him.

"I guess." His hand squeezed her shoulder lightly. "I hate to ask, but are you ready to go? We're kind of on a schedule here, after all."

Like she needed reminding.

They were halfway through the arrivals terminal when she remembered something. There were perks to being friends with a mechanic, she reflected as she turned to the man in question. They always carried way too much crap on their person.

"Jake, what do you have in your pockets right now?" she asked.

His eyes were confused, but he reached into his pockets, emptying the contents into his large palms and showing them to her. His wallet, his passport, a handful of foreign change, a few screws, a small pocket knife, and...

She plucked the piece of twine out of his hand. "Mind if I steal this from you?"

"Course not. Your shoelace break?"

She shook her head absently, taking her rings out of her pocket. With painstaking care, she threaded the coarse string through the delicate gold loops, knotting it securely before slipping it over her head and underneath her sweater.

She was sure Edward thought she'd sold them or thrown them out, but in her own sick, twisted way, keeping them there – right above her heart – was a constant reminder of what it had taken to get them, and what it had meant to give them up. The sacrifice and the struggle she was enduring, and the errant hopeful thought that maybe someday they would regain their rightful place on her finger.

Once this was over, she promised herself, then...

"Any preference for the car?" Jacob's voice interrupted her inner monologue.

She shook her head. "Anything with two seats and an engine. Need my mediocre French skills?"

He shook his head confidently, and she was struck again by the realisation that this man beside her was only eighteen. "It's an airport, Bells. I might not be bilingual but I'm sure someone at the rental desk is."

She nodded, hanging back to watch him lope away from her, needing these few minutes to get her head together. Unthinkingly her arms wrapped around her torso, her eyes darting back and forth through the crowd of people.

She felt a stab of fear at Jacob's distance, thinking of Alice and the momentary window this would allow her. Then she sighed and shook her head. It wouldn't matter. Her sister-in-law probably, rightfully hated her. Any brief flash of Bella in an airport wouldn't cause enough concern, or clue anybody in to her plan. How many airports were there in America? There was no reason for Alice to even suspect she had left the continent.

She stood there, lost in bitter memories for what felt like hours. She was so detached from her body that she almost jumped out of her skin when Jacob's warm arm wrapped itself around her waist.

"Everything sorted," he mumbled into her ear. "You ready to go?"

She rubbed the back of her hand across her eyes, feeling the weight of hours of travelling and jet lag. Stifling a yawn, she nodded firmly.

"Let's do this."

He was pacing. Back, forth, back, forth across the wooden floorboards of the tiny white room. His hands grasped at the roots of his hair, flexing as he pulled it painfully, and his eyes were dark and fierce.

Watching him, she felt like she was trapped in a cage with a tiger. His body was tense and trembling, a coiled spring ready to detonate.

"Jake," she said quietly, reaching out a hand in supplication.

He ignored her utterly, his eyes skittering around the room. She watched as they darted from the door to the window and back again, knowing that he was desperately searching for any way out of this mess.

"You know I have to do this," she whispered, dread rising in her throat like bile. "You know this is the only way."

He looked at her for a split second, and then turned away and punched the wall. A chunk of plaster fell off and disintegrated on the floor. She looked at him in disbelief.

He swallowed thickly. "I really thought that would make me feel better."

A knot of tension tangled tightly in her lower back.

"I am so sorry for putting you through this." Tears beaded in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. "You are... Jake, you are family, and I hate that..."

He held up a large hand to her. "Stop," he said blackly. "This isn't going to change anything between us. You're not the one I'm mad at."

A reluctant smile quirked the corner of her mouth. "You're mad at someone?"

He nodded, pacing again. "Vampires. Werewolves. Life in general."

She nodded solemnly. "I understand."

He looked at her as if seeing her for the first time, then sighed.

"Didn't you say you wanted to do something?"

She swallowed and looked down at the knife clutched so tightly in her hand.

"Yeah."

They stepped together, into the tiny, cobwebby bathroom. Sitting on the toilet seat, before the mirror, she grabbed a chunk of her hair and sliced through it, wincing as it fell to the floor.

She cut what she could reach, then handed him the knife. She only realised that she was crying again when his thumb collected a drop of moisture from her cheek. She stared at him fiercely, willing him not to say anything, and sighed in relief as he took over.

She wasn't sure what this gesture really meant. Maybe it was partly because of her routine nightmares of a white claw reaching for her as she ran, catching her by the ends of her hair and yanking her back. Maybe it was some kind of ancient sacrifice she felt she had to make to undo what she'd done to Edward – she'd denied her femininity for so long, now she removed another symbol of it. Whatever the reason, she remained quiet as Jacob hacked her hair to just above her shoulder line.

Afterwards, he left to resume pacing and she remained where she was, staring at the strands of dark brown on the floor. The hair Edward used to tangle his hands in.

She had no tears left in her. She rose shakily and moved to stand in the frame of the door, brushing her hand against the coarse ends of her chopped hair.

"He's late," she said quietly. Jacob halted and spun on his heel to face her.

"Of course he is," he spat viciously. "This whole process is more fun if you're on edge."

She swallowed, feeling dizzy. Her heart pounded away in her ears, painfully loud.

Jake halted suddenly at the window, the muscles in his back rigid, his jaw fixed. She knew that this was to be the very hardest part of their journey for him – that with every breath he took, he was battling fiercely against his most natural instincts to never let this happen – and yet she couldn't think about him, could not spare him even an ounce of empathy. All of her concentration was currently fixed towards keeping her hands in two tight fists at her sides, her body stiff and controlled.

She stared down at the simple white linen of the bed where she would die, her eyes moving over the threads of fabric, counting. Anything but this interminable silence.

It seemed like ages, but it was probably only a few minutes later when a knock stirred the air of the tiny room. She sprang to her feet. Jacob was already moving, but somehow she slithered past him and was first to the door. She noticed that her hand as it reached out to grasp the knob was steady and was ridiculously pleased at that fact.

She opened the door. She might have noticed that Jacob's body was curved protectively over her, or that he was trembling harder than ever, if her entire concentration hadn't been taken up by the vampire in front of her.

His long black hair streamed down his back, his red eyes beaming merrily at her as he reached out and grasped her hand, raising it to his papery mouth for a kiss. She shuddered imperceptibly.

"Mrs. Cullen," he said, his tone warm, his expression genial, "how lovely to see you again."

Please review.


	8. Chapter 7: Fire

Thank you addicttwilight2. It's still not mine.

-x-x-x-x-

In this part of the story I am the one who

Dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you,

Because I love you, Love, in fire and blood.

"I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You," Pablo Neruda.

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Seven: Fire**

Politely, she extracted her hand from his, fighting the urge to retch. She swung the door and Jacob's large brown hand reached out to catch it and hold it open, his knuckles straining white against his skin. Turning her back on Aro, she retreated back into the cool recesses of the loft room.

She could tell from his quiet chuckle that he found her attempt at bravery hilarious. Gritting her teeth, she sat down on the lumpy mattress of the bed and scooted so she was lying comfortably against the pillows.

He had followed her into the room, together with two guards she vaguely remembered from the last time she'd been in this castle. His filmy eyes looked around the simple whitewashed walls, noting their lack of luggage, taking his time in his appraisal. Jacob closed the door and then leaned back against it. His arms were trembling. She shot him a warning look.

Aro's voice snapped her back to the reality of the situation. "I trust you've been comfortable here?" he enquired politely.

She inclined her neck stiffly. He frowned.

"I had hoped that we could offer you one of the more luxurious rooms, but in retrospect this seemed to be the best option..."

She nodded again, understanding. The room was isolated, high up at the top of the castle, where in the olden days servants must have slept. Where nobody could hear her scream.

Finally, he advanced towards her, his hand reaching out to touch her cheek lightly. She wondered whether his insistence on physical contact was just another twisted attempt at humanity for him, or if he was still trying to glean the secrets of her silent mind.

He sighed regretfully. "Even in your human incarnation and with that abysmal haircut, you are most lovely. My young friend chose well."

Her hands balled into fists. She saw his eyes narrow as he noticed and quickly relaxed.

Forcing her voice to remain steady, she spoke. "Speaking of Edward."

Aro smiled brightly, motioned for her to continue.

Her heart beat faster. "I'd like some confirmation, please."

He quirked his eyebrow at her. "Confirmation of what, my dear?"

She stared at him, refusing to blink. "Of his continued existence. I assume your guard is still in place and waiting to strike. I want to make sure no pre-emptive action has been taken."

He laughed amiably. "Am I that untrustworthy, dear Bella? Might I remind you that you came to this place of your own free will?"

Her eyes hardened. "You didn't give me much of a choice."

His hands waved in the air dismissively, as if the tearing apart of her life had been a trivial detail. "The law is the law, Mrs. Cullen. Your husband broke it. We acted accordingly."

She noticed his vacillation between calling her by her christian and marriage names. She wasn't sure which was worse – the grating familiarity and contrived Italian accent with which he voiced the two-syllable cadence of Bella, or the nauseous reminder of her marriage and all it had engendered.

"I just want to make sure," she said coolly.

He sighed, shaking his head sadly as if her distrust in him was hard to bear.

"Very well," he said sorrowfully. "Felix..."

The burliest member of the guard stepped forward. Bella ignored his fiendish grin, ignored the flash of fire in Jacob's eyes as he noted how the vampire was eyeing her. She focused on the small silver phone in his hand.

Aro clicked his fingers, and seconds later the phone was pressed to his ear. She almost laughed at the absurd reality of a thousand-year-old vampire so at ease with modern technology.

His voice was sweet as he spoke into the receiver. "You haven't moved from your position, I trust?" A few seconds of silence stretched in the room, during which time he nodded approvingly. "Good. I am in need of proof of that, it would seem. You know what to do."

He hung up. Seconds later, the phone gave a cheerful chirp.

He handed it over to her, smiling as he motioned for her to read the new message. Warily, she pressed a button and then gasped as she recognised her husband's face in profile. He was standing near one of the upstairs bedrooms of the Cullen home. She couldn't glean any clues from his fuzzy expression, but he was at least standing upright and appeared to be unscathed.

She snapped the phone closed and handed it silently back to Aro.

"Thank you."

He nodded, looking at her He seemed to be waiting for her to make the first move.

Her mouth was suddenly dry. Ignoring her sweaty palms, she yanked her makeshift necklace up and over her head, stuffing the rings deeply into the pocket of her jeans, and swept what remained of her hair to one side.

"Let's just get this over with," she said quietly.

The world darkened as he leaned close to her, his large form blocking out the light from the window. She could feel her heart thundering in her chest, fighting, fighting. As if one in a dream, she saw his devil's eyes as they danced merrily, saw his loathsome head bow slightly and felt his ancient lips touch her neck.

He kissed her there once and that act was almost worse than what was to come. She cast her eyes to the corner of the room, finding Jacob, staring at him, the one good reminder of the life that was so shortly to end. One of her fists was clenched tightly around the rings in her pocket.

The seconds ticked by. Aro's lips were an inch away from her neck. As she waited for him to start, her brain kicked into overdrive. All she could think of was Edward and the last time they'd discussed her change.

It had been predictable, mundane really. While wandering through the streets of Paris, she had released Edward's hand to take a closer look at an ornate lantern at the side of the street. Her eyes fixed on the gold leaf and swirling, intricate design of it, and her right foot had found the only loose cobblestone in Paris. She'd tripped and landed hard on her knees on the road.

Dazed, she'd had about three seconds of gaping in abject terror as three separate lanes of maniacal French drivers bore down on her, and then Edward had caught her around the waist and pulled her back to safety.

She'd clung to him, watching in wide-eyed fear as cars whizzed past where she'd lain only seconds earlier. Edward's breathing was harsh in her ear.

Eventually they had both calmed and he'd drawn back to brush a lock of hair off her sweaty forehead.

"Promise me you won't leave it too long," he had whispered, his voice both tender and terrified. "One day I might be too late."

Grimly she gritted her teeth and wished fervently that she'd been wise enough to take him up on his offer. He'd been ready and willing, and she – she'd been so caught up in the desires of her weak human body that she'd delayed things, and therefore had led them headfirst into this stupid _stupid_ –

Then she felt teeth puncture her neck lightly, and her entire being dissolved under the first lick of fiery pain, rationality becoming impossible as her mind shrieked in disbelief and agony. She felt her body jerk, her spine bowing so much she actually feared it would crack, her every muscle spasming in shock and horror. Her stomach roiled and bucked, white-hot lances of pain spearing throughout every limb.

Dimly she was aware of a shrill sound in her ears, of air rushing past her and a lightness permeating her eyes as Aro's frame suddenly disappeared. She became aware that what she was hearing was her own screams, bubbling forth from her already-raw throat.

Then heat, blazing heat wrapped itself around her, and she screamed even louder, if possible. The flames intensified, dancing in sadistic glee around her, throwing her headfirst into a world of acid and razors and broken glass and everything painful in the world. There was no relief from it, though her body still jerked and pulsed, trying its best to free itself from the torture, to escape this internal hell.

"Edward," she mouthed, the sound imperceptible to her own ears. The fire intensified and she threw her head back, the cords of her neck standing out painfully as she shrieked her husband's name, as she moaned and sobbed and screamed, crying like a pitiful child for the comfort that would never come.

Then there was blissful darkness when her eyes squeezed themselves shut, a heavy weight in her chest as her muscles sagged and stopped fighting, and she let herself dive down to experience the false rest of unconsciousness for the very last time.

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	9. Chapter 8: Lost

Thank you addicttwilight2. Standard disclaimers apply.

-x-x-x-x-

For I am tired, my dear, and if I could lift my feet,

My tenacious feet from off the dome of the earth

To fall like a breath within the breathing wind

Where you are lost, what rest, my love, what rest!

~ "Elegy", D.H. Lawrence.

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Eight: Lost**

He didn't know how he'd gotten here.

He was back in Forks, in their family home, back where it had all started. And he had no idea how he'd gotten here or what the fuck had happened or how much time had passed or why everybody was tiptoeing around him and speaking in hushed monotones.

He blinked once or twice, finally realising that the gritty film over his eye was dust. How had that happened?

"How is he doing?" Emmett asked Jasper quietly, and he felt a stab of irritation. He was standing right there, for Christ's sake. What, did they think that just because his wife had left him...

Bella had left him. Bella was gone.

The air left his lungs. He knew that this revelation was not exactly new to him, but still he felt winded, as though someone had sucker-punched him in the gut. How had he forgotten, for even a fraction of a second, how had he shut down that completely, that...

Tiny hands on his shoulders, squeezing hard. He looked down in a stupor. Alice.

"Come _on_, Edward," she insisted, her mouth hard, her eyes desperate. "Focus. Breathe, or something. It's been days."

He felt like a very young child. "Alice, what...?" His voice whispered out of his throat – try as he might, he could not make it louder.

Relief flew across his sister's face. "Thank god. That's the first time you've spoken since..."

And then she was thinking and he was focusing and he could see himself now, could remember, curled in a ball in Seattle and the water and the screaming and then...

_Bella rending her hair, screaming for him as her body spasmed_.

He felt his knees buckle, but Alice had been prepared for this. Somehow her tiny frame slipped under his arm. Jasper was at his other side in an instant and together, they held him upright.

"Bella's changing." His voice was flat. He could feel Alice's eyes on his face as she nodded.

"How did..." he began, about to quiz her about the hours he was missing – the time in which she somehow got him home from Seattle. He stopped himself in his tracks, shaking his head. Not important.

Jasper was talking to him but both the actual words and the thoughts behind them turned to white noise as they hit the inside of his skull. He felt heavy and stupid, as if the air of the room was pressing down on him like the hand of God. Maybe this was what shellshock had felt like, in the war he'd once wanted so badly to be a part of. If only he'd known, back then, what a real battle was.

He gathered his feet under him and held up both of his hands for silence. Six babbling voices abruptly stopped, though that barely made a dent in the mental commotion of the room.

Very slowly and calmly he put one foot in front of the other until he was standing squarely at a window, looking out into the damp, steaming forest. He smoothed his hands over the painted windowsill, following the grains of wood like he'd once followed the delicate stitching of Bella's fingerprints. Their ridges were imprinted in his memory and he was sure that if he'd really tried, he could have traced the individual whorls out on a piece of paper. Such soft hands she'd had, and warm...

He closed his eyes and swallowed hard. Somehow that warmth was gone forever, somehow a cackling harpy called Fate had stolen his soft and gentle wife from him, and now what was he supposed to do? What?

He didn't realise that he'd actually voiced the question aloud until Esme answered him, her voice breaking.

"I don't know if we can do anything, Edward. We don't even know where she is. Who she's with. If... if she's being held there or if she's there by choice..."

A chunk of the wood he'd been holding onto broke off and fell to the floor. He closed his eyes, attempting to calm himself.

"So then what happens? Do we sit here and wait to find out?"

He knew Alice was going over and over the brief flash of Bella she'd gotten, ignoring the macabre sight of her sister-in-law's bloody neck, her clawing hands, moving over and over the tiny sterile room to find any clue to her location, any at all.

"I'm such a fool," he whispered bitterly. "Such a fool. I could have changed her years ago..."

He felt Carlisle's hand on his shoulder. "Son, please don't torture yourself this way. You must keep a clear head..."

He spun around to face his surrogate father, pointing towards Esme, spitting fire.

"Wait till your wife leaves you and you have to watch her writhe in agony without being able to do a damn thing about it, Carlisle, before you dare to tell me to calm down."

His father winced, and his hand fell from Edward's shoulder. He turned back towards the window, stared aimlessly out again, knowing he should apologise or at the very least feel bad, but failing to care.

She was dying. Somewhere, Bella was dying on an anonymous bed in a sterile room. God only knew what had happened. Bella being Bella, she'd probably gotten across the state line before running into a horde of hungry vampires. The thought made his throat close up – that somewhere his wife had been in trouble and he hadn't been there, hadn't known, hadn't protected her.

Then again, he reflected bitterly, maybe he was taking entirely the wrong slant on this. Maybe this had somehow been a matter of choice for her. Maybe she'd driven all the way to Denali, bribed Tanya or Kate. Maybe she'd finally lost all her trust in him, after three years of stupid mistakes on his part, and chosen another avenue to lead her towards what she'd wanted from the beginning. Maybe, maybe, maybe...

This was all his fault. He'd wanted this to happen. Ever since their honeymoon, when he'd realised just how much he needed her in his life. When she'd stumbled and fallen in front of rows of crazed Parisian drivers, his breath had been stolen from him in a rictus of fear in that nanosecond before he'd yanked her to safety. And finally he'd admitted what he'd secretly known all along – that he wanted her eternal, that he wanted them to be equals, that he'd always wanted it.

He'd told her then, told her he was ready. She'd laughed and kissed him, her voice bubbling against his lips as she'd agreed merrily. But not yet, she'd said, her shy smile lighting him up inside. Not right now, this is still too new for me to give it up right away.

And he'd given in to her desires, kept her close and prayed that would be enough.

And then... after all that... it hadn't been.

He clenched his fist and took a few deep breaths, then rested his forehead lightly on the cool glass of the window. His eyes stared out, registering the rain, the green, the trees. Somehow the images didn't really connect with his version of reality. No matter which way he turned, all he could see was Bella.

He'd never understood her. That was obvious to him from the start. But he'd thought, once, that he knew her, that he could anticipate what she wanted and needed, how she'd react in any given situation.

He realised now that he'd never really known her at all. He could never have anticipated her leaving. He'd thought that the sun could fall out of the sky before she'd abandon him. The Bella he knew could never hurt him like this. The bittersweet knowledge made his throat close up in grief.

Who was she now? What did she look like? Was the wife he adored replaced by a stone stranger?

Was she out there somewhere – alone, hurting, confused? Did she think of him at all? She screamed his name in the midst of her agony – was that a plea for his presence, or a curse at his existence?

Had her changing truly been an accident, or had she planned it out? If she had, in fact, planned the whole thing, could there be any rationale behind her actions – any shred of logic that could lead to him being able to forgive her for this?

Absently he realised that he'd been playing with his wedding ring, sliding it off and on his finger, twiddling it, turning it. Without glancing down, his thumb glided over the smooth inscription. _Always_. But she'd changed all that, hadn't she? She'd moved the goalposts, declared their marriage to be "unfixable", thrown what they had away like so much garbage.

His grasp tightened around the ring. For a few moments he entertained a wild fantasy of crushing it into dust, throwing the powder to the wind. Obliterating her memory with a simple physical act. There was peace in emptiness. Even boredom would be so much better than this constant, unremitting...

_Bella's voice as she spun joyfully in his arms, her wedding dress swirling around her slender legs. "Good thing I married a man who can dance..."_

_You may now kiss the bride... I, Isabella Swan, take thee, Edward Cullen... Take care of her, Edward, or so help me... May I present, for the first time... With my body I thee worship... In sickness and in health..._

He swallowed, sighed, and slid the cool clasp of gold back into place.

Slowly, outside stimuli made their way back into his brain. He became aware that Alice was the only member of the family left with him. Her arms were around him, squeezing hard, rubbing soothing circles on his back. He didn't know how long she'd been hugging him before he felt it.

"What do I do, Alice?" he murmured bleakly. "I don't know what to do."

She shook her head. The difference between their heights was so huge that her head barely came up to his bicep.

"I don't know either, Edward," she said sadly. "I'm so sorry. I feel like such a failure."

He leaned down and brushed a small kiss against the top of her head. He could find nothing else within himself to comfort her with.

In another room, the phone rang. Carlisle moved to pick it up, the tone of his voice more stressed than Edward could ever remember hearing it. He could have heard what was said through the speaker if he'd tried, but he just didn't care enough. Alice clearly did, though – her arms released him suddenly, and as she stood back, he could see a frown creasing the skin of her forehead.

She looked at him and opened her mouth to speak, but before she could get any words out, Carlisle called his name, sounding nonplussed. As one in a dream, he moved to the other room.

"What is it?" he asked absently.

Carlisle's eyes were full of dread. "Edward... Demetri is on the phone. He wishes to speak to you." His father's voice was confused, his thoughts even more so.

An ember of dread flickered to life in the pit of his stomach. Cautiously he reached for the receiver.

"This is Edward Cullen," he said quietly, his heart clenching.

"Edward." A generic voice, cool, calm, distant.

A pause.

He couldn't help himself. "You have my wife, don't you?" he whispered.

He heard the tracker draw a slow breath, and then he calmly voiced Edward's greatest fear.

"Isabella Swan entered Volterra four days ago and requested my master's assistance in changing her."

His breath escaped in a hiss. Demetri continued, seemingly unaware of any problem.

"Aro acquiesced to her request. She has now completed the change. As she has refused to accept our offer to become a member of the Guard, and as neither she nor my masters have displayed any interest in prolonging her visit, she will be returned to you before the week is out."

Without saying another word, or waiting to hear more, he gently placed the phone back on the receiver and turned to face his family, gathered around him, who were now staring at him in open-mouthed shock.

"She's coming back," he said simply. And once more returned to the window, to stare aimlessly into the night, seeing nothing but his wife's shape before him, moving closer and closer with every breath.

-x-x-x-x-

Time ceased to have any meaning. He stood there, still as a statue. Breathed in and out every so often, tasting the flavour of the air, waiting for a hint of strawberries, of peace.

Somewhere in the back of his mind he knew that he could run to the airport, meet them at the departure gate, sweep Bella into his arms and abscond with his wife. Somewhere else he cringed away from thoughts of such a reckless attitude. He was no longer capable of independent action – all he could do was wait here silently for her appearance, ready to take his cues, say whatever lines she needed him to say, and drink every second of her presence in like he was a man dying of thirst – which, in reality, he was.

Alice was frustrated and worried that she still could not see anything of the Volturi or of Bella. Her mind remained blank. Back and forth she paced, trying desperately to wring any drop of sense out of her misbehaving gift. Jasper sat cross-legged on the floor next to her, but his attempts to calm her went completely unnoticed. She was desperate, as she had been for so many months, and abstractly Edward mourned the loss of his carefree, cheeky sister.

He waited. And waited. And waited some more.

When the soft chirping of crickets outside heralded another dawn, Alice's blindness suddenly lifted. She saw Aro in a car, leaning forward to speak to the driver. Bella's small frame was beside him, clad in a dark cloak, her head downcast, her eyes hidden. The vision both brought him a strong sense of relief and pulled the knot of anticipation in his stomach even tighter.

Shadows had lengthened and lightened from the room innumerable times before he finally heard the purring of a low engine on the main road, the piercing invasion of Aro's thoughts, broadcasting warnings.

He was on the porch then, his shoulders tense, his lips trembling. His hands clenched and unclenched at his sides. Briefly he noted that his father and brothers were standing shoulder-to-shoulder with him, that their minds were reaching out towards him in hope and in fear.

A long black vehicle peeled into the driveway. It stopped, and a vampire got out, his countenance subdued, his mind unremarkable. Hurriedly he opened the door and Aro's wizened frame appeared as if by magic.

Edward was dimly aware of the older vampire's hands spreading out as if to welcome the family at large, of his booming, genial laugh and his broad smile. The greater part of him was straining for the first glimpse of his wife.

And then it happened. Aro stepped aside, and there she was.

She looked almost exactly the same as she had the last time he'd seen her. Her petite frame, shrunken even smaller, was folded in a black cloak, her shoulders hunched inwards, her head bowed. Her hair was scraped back from her head, pulled tightly into a knot. The bones of her face stood out sharply – fragile, feminine, still his wife. Still his.

Her eyes were downcast. He longed to lift her chin and peer into their depths, terrified yet fascinated as to what he might find there.

Belatedly he realised that his feet were moving, carrying him down the wooden steps of the porch, bringing him closer and closer to her.

A hand clamped around his wrist, and without his knowledge or volition, a low hiss escaped his chest.

Aro regarded him warily, all pretence of friendship erased. "Be warned, my young friend. She is not the same woman you married."

He couldn't think, couldn't filter, couldn't process the information Aro was giving him while his wife was so close, her warm scent wrapping around him like the arms of a mother, so missed, so longed for...

He shrugged free of Aro's grasp and finally he stood before her.

He cleared his throat. "Bella," he whispered hoarsely.

Finally, she looked up. He saw but did not fully comprehend the crimson shade to her irises. It did not connect with him because in that moment he was much more concerned with the fact that his wife was staring at him like she'd never seen him before in her life.

"Hello," she murmured quietly. Her soft voice was like the chiming of bells.

He swallowed rapidly, his mouth dry. She regarded him blandly, without a trace of fear, or longing, or love, or hatred, or... anything.

Her chest expanded with an inward breath. She reached out a slender hand as if to shake his.

"You must be Edward. I've heard a lot about you."

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	10. Chapter 9: Shadow

Thank you addicttwilight2. Standard disclaimers apply – I own neither Twilight nor the Sara Teasdale poem below nor the song "I've Got You Under My Skin" which is referenced later in the chapter.

-x-x-x-x-

Shall we, too, rise forgetful from our sleep,  
And shall my soul that lies within your hand  
Remember nothing, as the blowing sand  
Forgets the palm where long blue shadows creep  
When winds along the darkened desert sweep?

"Love and Death", Sara Teasdale.

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Nine: Shadow**

Nothing else existed.

Though he was beginning to realise that that could happen in lots of ways. For example, in the days right after Bella's departure, he had gone to their meadow and lain on his back in the grass, and he had only discovered that a full week had gone by when his family had come looking. On that occasion his mind had been utterly blank, devoid of any thought or emotion. The days had crept stealthily past him and he quite literally had been completely ignorant of the world around him.

Now, he was fully aware, alert and alive in a way he hadn't been in months. He could feel every cell in his body singing, could hear the grass under his feet inching its way towards the sun, could distinguish the multiple layers of his family members' each individual thought. But it didn't matter. None of it mattered.

Bella stood in front of him, her arm outstretched, her hand extended, her eyes as wide and innocent as a child's. He could see her chest move up and down, could sense every particle of air as it flowed over her skin towards him, could recognise what his life had been once and might possibly be again...

His fingers trembled, reached towards hers, and then he was clasping her hand hungrily and moving it to his cheek. He could sense that any further gesture of affection on his part would have scared her to death – could sense that even this small touch was scaring her to death – and so he didn't do what he most wanted, which was to grab her in a crushing embrace and run for miles.

Aro clapped him heavily on the shoulder, near his neck. He barely registered the older man's thumb brushing lightly against his skin, or the triumphant, smug air permeating his thoughts. He could hear his voice booming in the air around him, could sense his posturing in front of the family, could pinpoint every arrogant thought and word, but – he didn't care. He. Didn't. Care.

His eyes still searched her face. And then his mouth was opening and words were spilling out.

"You came back," he croaked, and watched her smile and nod tremulously in response.

"I was told that this is where I belong," she said, and her little voice was so hopeful that the statement came out as a question.

Aro stepped away – Carlisle stepped forward. Probably to make some appropriately paternal gesture. Frankly, Carlisle could have waltzed naked around him beating a drum for all Edward cared.

Belatedly he realised that Bella's hand was trembling on his cheek, that her eyes had gone from innocently bewildered to frightened and uncertain, and that his fingers were gripping hers even more tightly in response.

Horrified, he dropped her hand like a hot potato. "I'm sorry," he blurted, stunned at his lack of self-control.

He took a moment to recover, and realised that the long dark car that had brought Bella home was peeling out of the driveway. Aro had left.

Esme appeared in front of him, holding a hand out to Bella, taking her inside the house. His eyes followed her every movement, his body straining to follow, but Emmett and Jasper stepped forward to block his path.

"Edward." Jasper's voice was low and urgent. "Edward, this could be a..."

His attention snapped to his brother. "A what?"

Jasper paused, regarding him carefully.

"A trap," he said quietly. Emmett nodded his acquiescence.

Edward scoffed.

"You can't be serious. This is Bella we're talking about. You do remember Bella, don't you? Blushes a lot, trips over her own feet, incapable of lying or any kind of subterfuge for that matter?"

He was grinning now, high on this feeling, this my-wife-is-nearby elation. In the silence that followed, his jubilation fell a notch, other, more uncomfortable emotions making themselves known.

"Well?" he demanded, his eyes fierce on his brother's.

It was Emmett who replied. "We remember Bella, Edward," he said quietly. "We're just not sure you do."

-x-x-x-x-

This felt right.

She knew it deep in her bones, like she hadn't known anything since she'd woken up in that strange room with the light bouncing its brilliance into her tender eyes and the most godawful stench she could imagine assaulting her nostrils.

She had no background, no reference point upon which to judge her feelings, and so was spinning and spinning in this strange world where nothing made sense – but the emotion engulfing her now felt almost exactly like what the hot bath she'd taken before she'd left the castle had felt like. Except that had warmed her bones from the outside, and this warmed them from the inside.

The woman – Esme, she remembered, her name was Esme – had led her to a big, open room where a grand piano sat in a shaft of light from a large window. She had been led as far as the couch and now sat neatly down, observing all around her in fascination.

Esme sat next to her, and Bella could see a stiffness lining her shoulders – unnatural in one so soft and maternal. The tiny one with the dark hair was still looking at her with trepidation – as if she was a snake about to strike – and the blonde was simply inscrutable, leaning against the far wall and inspecting her nails.

"Would you like something to drink?" The dark-haired woman spoke suddenly, uncertainly. "We have... we have some Coke somewhere, I think... or I could make you some tea..."

Bella shook her head, bewildered, but feeling her throat close and her stomach contract at the thought. Was this what normal vampires did? Was she somehow flawed, that all she wanted was... was...

"No, of course not," the woman muttered, shaking her head. "Stupid of me, to think..."

Alice! That was the name. She'd remembered, suddenly. Well, that counted for something, right?

She cleared her throat, proud of herself. "Thank you anyway, Alice."

Her simple words somehow drew a gasp from the room. Now all three were looking at her as though she were a hissing cobra, and she felt cold panic grip her entrails. What? What had she done...?

Esme exhaled sharply, and there was a look in her eyes that Bella somehow knew, instinctively, didn't belong there. "You know her name?" she asked quietly.

She was clueless for another second, and then inspiration struck. "Oh! Oh of course, Aro told you... I'm sorry. Bits and pieces come back to me every so often... I didn't even know my name when I woke up, but then I remembered it, and I remembered I was once human and married and..." She faltered at the look on their faces. "...and... that I needed to come back," she finished lamely.

Alice's face was like stone. She turned to Esme.

"We're about to have a problem," she murmured, and jerked her head towards the door.

Bella followed her gaze and instantly the warm feeling blazed in her chest, lighting her up again. The man called Edward was standing at the doorframe.

Instantly she felt her cheeks stretch, a smile stuttering out. God, she thought, I haven't done that since... I can't quite...

But he looked somehow different, she thought, stiffer, more contained. Her face froze as her eyes met his and she saw...

An old feeling welled up, one buried deep between layers of other emotions, all mixed up and tangled together in her head. Her brow furrowed.

Fear, she thought. She was definitely afraid. But why?

She looked again, met his eyes. Oh, she thought.

Black fire blazed at her from across the room. She felt as though she were stripped bare, her secrets exposed for his pleasure, her every imperfection there for him to see.

She flinched reflexively, her breath hitching in her throat. One fluid movement had her back to the corner, rounded, her every limb trembling with the need to protect herself from the threat evident in Edward's gaze.

The other blond was back, crouching in front of her, baring his teeth and hissing at her, and she shrank back submissively. And then he was gone, soaring through the air as Edward appeared behind him, caught him by the scruff of the neck and threw him bodily from the house, straight through the plate-glass window she'd so admired earlier.

_Glass falling, slicing through flesh, sending searing darts of pain through her body... looking up to meet Jasper's wild gaze, his teeth snapping together audibly..._

She curled into a ball and rocked as the house descended into chaos around her. Dimly she heard Rosalie – Rosalie, that was it – snarling, Esme and Alice's voices shrieking for calm, Jasper – Jasper! – cursing at Edward. And Edward's body stood in front of hers, his back turned towards her, his fists clenched and his shoulders squared.

His voice bellowed above the rest. "Goddammit, she is part of this family and you will treat her as such until I say otherwise! _Do you understand me?_"

The racket rose another decibel, indignant voices clamouring to be heard, and finally she couldn't take it anymore. Spying an out, she slipped inside another room and closed the door firmly, leaning her back to it and rubbing her temples firmly.

She was in the kitchen, she realised. Implements that surely must never have been used for cooking gleamed from every surface, and somehow she could hear soft, crooning music, even over the din that was only slightly reduced by the thick wooden door.

In fact, if she really thought about it, she could hear crickets chirping in the wood five miles away and trucks downshifting on the highway, but then again, she didn't really want to think about it too much.

She would do something normal, she decided, something so mundane and human that it must have been second nature to her, once. Eventually everyone would shut up and things would start to make sense again. She was almost sure of it.

-x-x-x-x-

He was sure that Carlisle and Esme would share some strong words with him later about how he had essentially kicked them out of their own home. He was also sure that Jasper was fit to tear him limb from limb for his stupidity and that Rosalie's veneer of disdain had grown another couple of inches thick.

He didn't care. Did not care.

He took a deep breath through his nostrils, his entire being rejoicing as he detected freesia. The quiet both enfolded him in the satisfaction that he was alone with his wife and scared him slightly. Somehow in the fracas she had slipped away. Where was she?

He listened intently for a moment, searching for the family double-thud of her heartbeat, before catching himself and realising that... that...

Cutting off his train of thought, he detected the soft padding of her feet on tile.

Quietly, he opened the door leading to the kitchen. And stopped, his heart leaping in his throat.

She had discarded the long robe he so detested, thrown it carelessly over the back of a chair. Underneath it she'd worn cutoff jeans and a tank top. Her legs were bare, her scraped-back hair enhancing the curve of her neck, her shoulders rounded and gleaming in the soft light. The scent of her poured around him, wrapping him up, drugging him into complete stupidity so that all he could do was lean against the door frame and do his best to keep breathing.

She turned to look at him, cocking her head like a small bird.

"Sorry about that," he said quietly, his throat dry. "Some... family matters needed to be taken care of."

She paused, and then nodded very solemnly. He swallowed.

"What are you doing?" he asked, seeing for the first time the mountain of spotless dishes stacked in piles everywhere.

She opened her mouth uncertainly. "I'm... cleaning dishes."

He was honestly puzzled. "Why?"

She paused again, looking at him apprehensively. "I... don't really know," she said in confusion.

He nodded slowly. He knew he had scared her before and so he kept his movements easy as he manoeuvred his body so he was perched on the edge of a countertop, and smiled at her.

"Don't let me stop you," he said gently.

She watched him for a few seconds more, then nodded jerkily, turning back to the sink.

He watched as her hands, gloved in suds, lifted and scrubbed at a plate. Her movements were stiff and erratic, every line in her body speaking of her tension.

He thanked god for whomever had been working in the kitchen before this – for whomever had put the soft jazzy music on to play. Softly he began to hum along with the song and watched in disbelief as his wife began to relax. As her hips began to sway gently, her shoulders becoming fluid, her whole body reflecting the crooning music.

And he realised something he'd forgotten in the long months without her. That there was beauty everywhere, even in this mundane household task. That the curve of a woman's waist could be a place for his hand to sit and that the crook of a neck could shelter and absorb any pain. As always, she brought out a simple awe in him, a gladness to be alive that he'd never known before her.

All he could see was light and hope in this moment, all was Bella Swan in the kitchen cleaning, like so many times before.

A new song began, and he watched in joy as carefully his wife set down the plate she'd been holding and walked towards him, her movements somehow both shy and sure, her hand outstretched for his. There was a look in her eyes that both scared and exhilarated him at once.

He was resolved not to touch her unless she specifically requested it, whether with words or with her body, and so his hand lay limp in hers till she squeezed his fingers, his other arm lying uselessly by his side till she brought it up to wrap it around her waist. And then they were somehow cheek to cheek and his eyes were closing and her soft body was moving against him, so soft how was she still so soft, and before he knew it they were whirling around the kitchen.

_I would sacrifice everything, come what might, for the sake of having you near..._

She sang into his ear. He couldn't ever remember hearing her sing in his presence before.

They whirled past a blue teapot that had once belonged to Esme's mother. He was happier than he could ever remember being. What did that colour remind him of, he wondered absently. That bright, robin's-egg blue...

Her eyes, pleading, so different from his wife's. Hands in his hair. A dying voice in his head, pleasedon'tdothisI'lldoanything...

He froze in position, his hand falling limply from Bella's waist. Desperately he tried to fight it, but it would not be stopped.

He was a murderer. A monster.

He stared into his wife's ruby-red eyes. Calmly, he stepped back and walked away and out of the house, hearing the dying remnants of Sinatra echo like a tolling bell.

_Wake up to reality..._

-x-x-x-x-


	11. Chapter 10: Reluctance

Thanks as always to addicttwilght2. Standard disclaimers continue to apply.

-x-x-x-x-

Ah, when to the heart of man  
Was it ever less than a treason  
To go with the drift of things,  
To yield with a grace to reason,  
And bow and accept the end  
Of a love or a season?

~ "Reluctance", Robert Frost

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Ten: Reluctance**

The trauma of her change had wiped her mind so completely that when she'd first awoken, every single social nicety she'd been exposed to since birth had been nonexistent. For the first few hours of her first day of immortality, she had been abrasive, harsh, demanding, and completely ignorant of her rudeness. After that she'd mostly remained silent and watchful, absorbing every tiny piece of information from the very air around her.

It was an active process and sometimes it exhausted her – a mental heaviness so absolute that she would close her eyes for hours at a time, and so feign the foreign human process of _sleeping_.

Her social map was by no means complete. She still could not separate what she was _meant_ to feel in any given situation from what she _actually_ felt, and so sometimes giggled at sentences the user had not meant to be funny. So she was not sure which emotion _should_ have accosted her when Edward walked out of the kitchen. What she did feel, what she was still feeling, was shock and confusion followed by blind, indignant rage.

The potency of the feelings whipping through her body grounded her long enough for Edward to make it out of the house. Then she stamped her foot impotently – something she hadn't consciously done since she was about four – and swiftly followed him.

Outside the world was a riotous mess of sensation. She might have paused to focus on how she could actually hear the individual leaves of trees stretching towards the sun, or how she could see, with startling clarity, the many-faceted eyes of insects that scurried, terrified, in her wake, if she had not been gripped with such unfathomable and vicious fury.

Edward had disappeared from sight, running silently through the forest, but her new senses detected his clean, woodsy smell due south, and so that was where she went.

As she ran, she contemplated the bilious rage churning in her stomach. Young as she was, she somehow knew that an action as simple as his stepping away and walking calmly from the house should not have engendered such a strong response from her. Even as her peripheral vision flashed red-hot with wrath, she wondered about her motives. Why should his leaving her prompt these feelings? Surely he had done so many times...

An old memory dusted itself off. Edward's voice in her ear, promising he would never leave her again, that she would never be alone. Edward swearing that he couldn't live without her, Edward sobbing against her with the depth of his need for her.

She nearly snarled in frustration. Having these pieces of her former life was worse than knowing nothing at all about it.

How _dare_ he walk away, how _dare_ he not even try to work things out, how _dare_ he... She muttered various obscenities as she ran, her legs pushing faster with the fuel of her ferocity, her voice hissing from her lungs. She didn't bother to duck under low-hanging branches, didn't care at the thorns that whipped against her skin, twined themselves around her legs in a pathetic attempt to trap and ensnare her. She couldn't feel a thing. She realised, in fierce joy, that she was just as strong as he was now.

Breath puffed from her lungs and escaped her mouth in clouds – abruptly she realised that she could just as easily stop breathing, and she promptly did. Still her legs pumped on.

She realised that she was expecting the sharp ache of exhaustion to pierce her thighs, to run a stitch through her side and trip her up, leaving her red-faced and panting. No such thing occurred. Her body moved efficiently, silently, and she felt she was gliding through the forest like a pale white ghost.

No – it was more than that – she was so aware of everything around her, of how the soft earth shaped itself around her feet as she ran, of how her presence struck unease and even terror into every animate creature in the woods, that she felt almost like an outside observer, viewing life through the harsh unforgiving gaze of the undead. Aware of the beauty of the world and also aware of its ridiculous fragility.

A glimpse of copper-coloured hair through the trees. She pulled her mind back to a single sharp point of purpose and ran faster. His body came into full view, the muscles of his back taut as he ran.

"Edward!" she shrieked, and watched as he stumbled – actually stumbled – and turned to face her.

His face was ashen with shock. And no wonder. Anybody would worry at the sight of her – a ferocious shrew with twigs in her hair, ready to tear her husband's throat out.

_Husband_... the word echoed in her brain, but before she could wonder at it, he was within leaping distance. And leap she did – propelling her body from a boulder in furious forward momentum. Edward was still frozen in astonishment, and she tackled him easily. He crumpled like a piece of wet paper under her assault, the pair of them rolling head-over-heels before coming to a stop.

She pinned him with her body, her hands slamming his to the ground, her legs twined around his. She glared at him.

"What is your problem?"

He looked terrified. "Bella... what...?"

"We were having a perfectly lovely time before you decided to pull that little stunt! What is the matter with you, Edward? Can't you just be happy, for once in your life? Do you have to turn everything into an opportunity for you to show off what a martyr you are? Why didn't you just _trust_ me? _Why did you walk away from me?_"

Her voice was shaking, she realised, her body convulsing with a foreign grief. The words were not her own. She had no idea where they'd come from.

Now he didn't just look shocked anymore. Now he looked incensed. His entire body vibrated with fury. Suddenly she was not the one pinning her hands to his – his fingers clenched around hers, squeezing so hard that she winced reflexively, though she felt no actual pain.

That one unchecked movement was enough for him. He threw her off easily, was on his feet again before she could blink. He towered over her as she blinked up at him.

"I'm not the one who walked away, Bella!" he roared, his voice raw with pent-up feeling. "I'm not the one who gave up!"

She regarded him icily. "Sure doesn't seem that way to me."

"No fucking wonder, Bella. I'm the only one in this twisted farce who remembers what you were like before!" His fingers pulled at the roots of his hair – his face was demented. Furious, frustrated, raw, and somehow still painfully vulnerable.

Suddenly she felt cold, and she wrapped her arms around herself as she stared at him.

"What was I like?" she enquired curiously.

His face had shut down now. She had no idea how he'd done that – how a man who seemed literally ripped apart with emotion one moment could appear completely blank and uncaring the next.

"It doesn't matter," he said coldly, turning his back on her.

She leapt to her feet and was facing him again before he could take so much as one extra step forward.

"Don't you do that," she said sharply. "Don't you turn away from me, Edward. We're going to talk about this, whether you like it or not."

Despite her put-on bravado, she felt unbelievably confused. One Bella was sitting back and observing their interactions in fascination, as if watching a play she'd never before seen or even heard of. Another was fully cognisant and enraged, spitting words at this man that on the surface appeared to make perfect sense.

His face was bitter as he looked at her. "What do you want from me, Bella?" he asked. His voice was so tired that it creaked at the edges. For once his face carried the weight of all he'd seen and done in his long, long life.

She paused. "I just want to understand." It seemed simple enough to her.

He rubbed at the bridge of his nose with a thumb and forefinger – a gesture so strangely familiar that it made her want to weep with frustration. "That makes two of us," he said blackly.

"What happened to us, Edward?" she whispered. "I'm lost here, I have all these feelings and I just... I don't understand. Aro told me – he told me we were married..."

He turned to face her. He looked very old and very sad.

"We _were_ married, Bella," he whispered, his voice cracking. He reached out and brushed the knuckles of his hand very gently across her cheek. She felt her skin flash live with electricity and shivered, wondering if he felt it too.

"Were we happy?" she asked, uncertain, unwilling to break this spell.

His entire face lifted, his mouth smiling, his eyes soft. "I was happier than I have ever been in my life," he said simply. She noticed his use of _I_, and wondered, in frustration, what her own feelings had been.

"What happened, Edward? Why are you so angry at me?" she asked sadly.

His shoulders dropped.

"I'm sorry," he said dejectedly. "I don't mean to be angry – I know it's not your fault. It's me, I should have known better. You were so young. You didn't know what you were getting into. You had your whole life ahead of you, and suddenly you were trapped into marriage with me – stifled and shut out and looking at an eternity of _this_."

He gestured at his own chest dismissively, smiled sadly at her. "I knew I wasn't good enough for you, Bella. I should have been stronger. I essentially blackmailed you into marriage. You were so – you wanted things so desperately to be good between us that I don't think you considered how few choices you were leaving yourself with."

She frowned. This did not sound like her, in any reality.

"Are you covering something up?" she asked bluntly. "Or is this self-flagellation actually justified in your head?"

He looked surprised and then annoyed. One of his eyebrows quirked at her.

"I'm being entirely truthful with you, Bella," he bit, his recounting of all his failings suddenly forgotten. "I loved you, you married me, and then you left."

She couldn't ignore the way his face crumpled at the corners, or how he suddenly couldn't meet her gaze.

"Why did I leave?" she wondered aloud, as if the question were purely academic.

His head snapped up, black eyes finding hers. "Haven't I explained it clearly enough?"

She shook her head. "If I loved you enough to marry you," she said clearly, "then I loved you enough to stay."

His face froze. "Evidentially not." His voice sounded like a dead thing.

"There must have been a reason beyond this," she said defiantly, her brow furrowing as she thought. "Did you – did we fight?"

_...get away from me, don't touch me, I can't think when you touch me, just stop it..._

She swallowed, and did her best to drown the remnants of her own voice in her head with some ill-timed humour.

"Did I hit you with a frying pan for leaving your dirty socks on the floor?" she asked, her voice teasing. "Did you spend every waking minute playing golf with the boys while the children screamed and the house burned? Did I..."

"Be serious, dammit!" he snarled, his hands once more pulling at the roots of his hair.

His torment sobered her. She touched him lightly on the shoulder, contrite.

"I'm sorry," she said quietly. "I'm just trying to make sense of this."

"Why do you have to dredge all of this back up? Can't you just accept what I'm telling you?"

"_No_," she said fervently. "Edward, I can't understand how..."

"How what?" His face was imploring.

Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Can't you feel this?" she asked quietly, gesturing at the air between them. "This is... huge, Edward. There has to be a reason why I only feel normal when I'm around you. There has to be a reason, and –"

His large hand grasped hers. "Please stop this," he said desperately. "Bella, you don't understand – I've been through all of this before, seen it all, heard it all, done it all. Please don't drag me back into this, I can't survive it twice."

"What did I do that was so terrible?" she whispered, watching his face. "Surely, if I left, there would have been a reason – one I couldn't have told you. Surely it had something to do with how much I... how much you meant to me. Why didn't you trust that?"

His hand dropped hers as though it were suddenly red-hot.

"I trusted you implicitly, Bella," he growled. She could see the shadow of something black and dangerous lurking behind his swiftly-cracking mask. "I trusted you so much that I believed you when you said you loved me, only me, when you told me you could never want him. When you promised, again and again, that I was all you needed, and then turned around and ran off with another man!"

She felt something catch in her chest. "What did you say?"

"Ask Jacob Black," he retorted coldly, bitterly. "I'm sure he can explain it to you."

Her entire body seized up.

"Jake?" she whispered, her mouth open, her mind humming.

Jake... running with Jake, hiding with Jake, stuck like rats in that crummy motel room, nights on the back of his motorcycle... Jake holding her, protecting her, loving her as much as he was able... Jake talking to Leah on the phone, whispering his devotion, his voice choked with longing... Jake watching over her, Jake fighting for her... Jake...

"Oh god," she managed, and then her entire body was shaking.

Edward's face was a picture of pain buried beneath layers of toxic disgust.

"If you think I'm going to stand here and watch you remember your lover, you have another think coming," he spat bitterly.

She felt bile rise in the back of her throat, corrosive fear bubbling in the pit of his stomach, and then she was standing, reaching for Edward, clutching at his jumper with desperately clawing hands.

"Edward," she managed to sob, "Edward, you don't understand... he saved me, and... I think they killed him, Edward."

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	12. Chapter 11: Silence

Thanks to addicttwilight2 and to all those kind enough to read and review. Standard disclaimers apply.

-x-x-x-x-

In secret we met

In silence I grieve

That thy heart could forget,

Thy spirit deceive.

If I should meet thee

After long years,

How should I greet thee?

With silence and tears.

"When We Two Parted", Lord Byron.

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Eleven: Silence**

He was such an idiot.

"This is stupidly risky," he warned her, out of the corner of his mouth. "This is just... plain stupid."

She swallowed. "I know," she said, her voice small, her lost eyes looking up at him.

He sighed, turned from her, though it went against his every natural impulse. "Let's go."

"Wait." He turned back to see her arms outstretched to him. "Can I... can you..."

He knew what she wanted – or what he thought she wanted. And he thought his throat would crack wide open from the lump in it.

He set his mouth in a firm line. "You're just as fast as me now, Bella," he said harshly. "See for yourself."

She lowered her arms back to her sides, looking ridiculously disappointed.

Then they flew silently towards the forest, towards the reservation, towards the treaty line.

Nothing about any of this made sense. Why had she chased him? Why had she yelled at him? And why, for the love of all that was good and pure, _why_ had he yelled back?

For all intents and purposes, she was little more than a child right now. To heap the blame of her previous cunning upon her, to blame this stranger for the faults his wife had committed, well... that was just plain wrong. Not to mention stupid.

And, if Jasper and Emmett were right in their suspicions...

Finally he was allowing himself to think about it, warily. In a way it would be so much easier to understand – if Bella had been placed in his household by some malevolent Volturian watchdog, if her sole purpose was to torment him further. That would actually be easier to accept than the alternative – than believing they'd been given this second chance because they somehow deserved it.

If Bella's aim was to witness his destruction, she was about six months too late. Nothing could be worse than living in the knowledge that she didn't love him anymore.

Then again, there was no reason for him to bare his jugular to her, to place his heart and soul and manhood into her hands and let her tear him to pieces... _again_. Christ sake, he could show a little restraint. This woman who looked so like the wife he'd once lost – she was nothing but a stranger whom he had no reason to trust.

And yet, here he was, pandering to her every whim.

Maybe this was a trap. Maybe this had been her aim all along – to entice him out to these woods, alone, so that Jacob Black could finally tear him apart.

Briefly he considered stopping, turning back, letting her go on alone. Or dropping his pace so he could run behind her, watch for danger, make his escape if necessary.

He sighed and let the idea go, let the weight of his pathos sit heavily back on his shoulders. He knew he could not do that – couldn't sit back and let Bella risk her life, or place her between him and danger. The idea was sickening. And he reflected that if Black was lying in wait to be his executioner, well... really the dog would be doing him a favour. Ironic, really. Death would be easy compared to living alongside Bella – all he'd ever wanted and never deserved.

The reservation was within sight now, he noticed, putting a restraining hand on his wife's arm – ignoring the way his skin flashed hot with the contact. The last thing he wanted was to cross the treaty line – adding a war with the wolves to the mess his life had become might finally tip him over the edge.

They slowed, and stopped. Bella's foot was twitching impatiently, exactly 4/5ths of an inch from the border.

"Shush," he warned gruffly, and for the first time in what felt like forever, he embraced his gift – pushing it so it swept through the Quileute lands, searching for conscious thought.

His body relaxed infinitesimally. "Sam is coming," he informed her distractedly, focusing on the wolf's thoughts. They were – typically – wary.

Sam's body – his human body – appeared through the trees. Edward chuckled inwardly, watching Bella's whole body recoil as the stench hit her. He turned his body slightly towards her, intending to make a crack about how now she finally understood what they'd been talking about for so long – and reconsidered when he saw her chalky face, her wide, tremulous eyes.

"Edward. We've been expecting you." Sam's greeting was cordial – on the surface at least. It had been so long since he'd used his skills in any purposeful way – he was unable to sift through the endless shifting maze of the dog's thoughts, unable to divine his intentions.

Bella's voice broke the air between them. "Where's Jacob?" she whispered hoarsely. Her entire body was curved into his, seeking – what? Protection? Affirmation? Support?

He nearly snorted in self-derision. After all this time, he still assumed she wanted him to act like a husband towards her.

Sam let his eyes linger upon Bella's face. Edward realised that the dog was troubled – for what reason he could not tell.

"Jacob is at home," he said quietly.

He could hear his wife's breath whoosh into her lungs in relief. He balled his hands into two fists.

"He's alive, then?" he asked tightly.

Sam's gaze was full of sadness, of the weight of responsibility. His reply was succinct. "Barely."

Bella swallowed audibly, then licked her lips. "Do you know what happened?" she whispered.

Sam's face snapped in shock. "You don't remember?" he asked in disbelief.

For a simple mutt, his mind was remarkably controlled, and so Edward could not glean even a second's advance time between his thoughts and his words. He was reduced to simply listening as Sam spoke.

"Early in the year," he began, watching them both guardedly, "Jacob came to me and informed me that you needed assistance – that your life, and the lives of others, depended on it. Naturally I was wary, considering who you'd married, the choice you'd made..."

At this Edward lost control and snarled, briefly flashing his teeth. Sam remained unperturbed.

"I could not convince Jacob to consider things more fully, to involve anybody else, or even to wait until the night was out. He departed with you that same night."

Bella's breaths were hissing into her lungs by now. "Did he tell you why I came to him?"

Sam shook his head. "He told me that the less people knew the better – which is why he has not assumed his wolf form since. He maintained regular contact with Leah, which is the only way we knew he was even still alive." His voice tightened. "The next time any of us saw him was when he was unceremoniously dumped here yesterday, with nearly every bone in his body broken."

Bella cried out hoarsely, her body sagging against his. Sam let a single thought slip from behind his impassive mental mask – _after all that Jacob done for her, she still chooses the leech... then again, she's one of _them _now_...

Edward's voice was low, deadly. "Did he say who did it?"

Sam shook his head. "He hasn't yet regained consciousness."

He could feel every line of Bella's body trembling, almost vibrating with emotion. "Will he be okay?" she choked.

Sam's lip curled. "No thanks to you."

Edward bridled at the insult, though his wife seemed to ignore it completely.

Sam stepped back, his entire body screaming _go away_. "I've told you all I know," he informed them coldly. "If you value what Jacob has done for you at all, you will leave him in peace now."

Edward stepped forward and opened his mouth, ready to protest, but was stayed by the shocking sensation of his wife's fingers squeezing his.

He looked back at her, watching in confusion as she stepped forward to address Sam one more time. "Please... when you see him..." She stopped as her voice broke and swallowed. "Please tell him I said... I can never thank him enough," she beseeched, her eyes pleading. "Please will you tell him that?"

The pack leader nodded curtly once, then disappeared from whence he'd come.

He opened his mouth to speak – not sure of what he wanted to stay – but was flummoxed by the sight of his wife turning her back to him and walking away, towards the trees.

Confused, he followed her.

-x-x-x-x-

She didn't stop moving until they'd reached a clearing in the middle of the woods. It was not the meadow. He had to swallow a lump in his throat once he realised how badly he'd wanted it to be.

Watching her, he felt insubstantial, as though he were watching the entire scene from a great distance. He wondered bitterly how it was that he could see the lines of her body flowing in movement and want her so badly, and in the next instant catch a glimpse of her eyes and feel an anger so intense he shivered with the force of it. It was all there – every answer he wanted lurked in her secretive brain, locked behind her eyes, and if he were just a little crazier, he might have wanted to crush her skull like an egg just to see what would come flying out.

She was breathing very slowly and deliberately. He approached her cautiously.

"Bella?" he asked, his voice full of trepidation.

Slowly, she pivoted to face him. Her face was a mask of calm, but he sensed her thoughts whirring beneath, like how herculean movements of the deepest layers of earth could sometimes be felt by the people above as a subtle tremor.

"I don't understand any of this," she murmured, and there it was – the tremor. He watched her carefully.

Her hand reached up and worried at her forehead. He ached with tenderness for that gesture, so familiar in another life.

"I remember... I remember some parts, but not others," she said, her eyes closed, her voice shaking. "I don't understand – any of it. It's just... it's so..."

Her eyes snapped open in shock. He wondered why for a moment, before realising that with every word she'd said, he'd moved closer to her until his hand finally came to rest on her soft cheek, his thumb working out the small knot between her eyebrows.

He inhaled sharply and took a step backwards. "Sorry," he mumbled, horrified. "Sorry, I –"

She was moving closer. "It's okay," she whispered. "I..."

"What?" He stared at her.

She looked defeated. "Nothing."

He clenched his fists, trying so hard to contain his frustration.

"Why don't you tell me what you remember?" he inquired, fighting to keep his tone gentle.

She looked at him with wide and trusting eyes. "Is that smart? This... Edward, I know this must be frustrating for you..."

_No you don't,_ he thought silently. _You have absolutely no idea._

"I'll be fine," he said curtly, wincing inwardly as he noted her flinch.

She paused for a long time, thinking. Her right hand scratched idly at her left forearm, and for a moment he thought his wife's intermittent eczema had flared up, and almost raised his hand to cool the irritating rash with his flesh. The sun glittered inhumanly on her exposed skin, taunting him.

"There..." she began, and stopped, thinking again. "He... I went to him. Jacob, I mean." As if he needed clarification.

"When?" he asked, barely noticing how his impatience leaked through the simple word.

She licked her lips, pained. "I... I don't know."

He nodded brusquely, motioning to her to continue.

"I was upset. I don't know why." She paused again, her forehead screwing up like it always did when she thought deeply. "You... you weren't there. I don't – I can't remember –"

He cut her off. "I was hunting. With my family. That weekend, after everything... after you..."

_...made love to me... made me hope we could find a way back to each other... and left._

He couldn't say it.

Her voice was slightly braver now that she'd ascertained he wasn't going to go ballistic.

"I went to Jake, and I asked for help... I told him my life depended on it, and three hours later we left."

He swallowed. "What do you mean, your life depended on it?"

She shrugged helplessly. He bit back a groan. How was it that she could remember everything except the one detail that would explain the rest?

He ignored the larger truth struggling to get through, the one saying _she was afraid of you, your wife thought you would kill her if she tried to leave, your wife ran to a dog for protection instead of to you_, and watched her intently.

Her shoulders were slumped in defeat, but her eyes were bright with relief as she looked at him. Sharing this burden with him was making her feel better.

That thought was so incongruent with what he'd once believed about Bella – a woman full of secrets, of lies – that he flicked it off like an offending gnat.

"_What's wrong? Why won't you talk to me? Have you been – Bella, have you been crying? Bella, please, I can't fix this if you won't talk to me..."_

"What are you thinking?" she whispered. He looked at her and could not reconcile the image of this woman standing in front of him with the wife he'd known. She seemed so innocent, pure and beautiful. She was perfect, so how could she have hurt him so badly? She was everything he wanted, so why did he hate her so much?

She moved closer to him. Her fingers brushed against his, and his body snapped to attention.

He shook his head furiously. "Please. Don't."

She cocked her head to the side, like a small inquisitive bird. "Why not?"

Something large and hard was blocking his throat, making him hoarse. "Just don't."

She licked her lips. He watched hungrily.

"I'm sorry," she offered shyly. "I just feel... I feel better when I'm touching you."

He was aware that a large part of himself was so closed off and bitter that it just wanted to lash out at her – to hurt her in any of the myriad of ways she'd tortured him, to make her hurt just as badly as he – but looking at her like this, so innocent and naive, so like the girl he'd first met, he couldn't find it in him.

The realisation should have brought him solace. Instead, all he felt was a dull despair. Would he never learn? Was there anything she could do to make him stop loving her so violently?

Her face had fallen at his silence. He sighed.

"Bella," he said gently. "Bella, you don't remember anything about me, do you?"

She watched him hopefully. "I remember that you're my husband," she whispered reverently. "I remember that I –"

He held his hand out to her palm up. "You don't really mean that, though, do you?" he asked. "You don't actually remember me proposing to you, and you don't remember marrying me. All you know about me is what Aro told you, right?"

She bit her lip, nodded.

"Do you see how that's not the same?" he asked softly. "You don't remember what happened between us, but I do. You don't know the why, and neither do I – but Bella, I can guess, and my guesses are usually pretty accurate. And I can't – I can't be around you for when you remember that. I can't do it. I'm not strong enough."

Her bottom lip was trembling.

"You don't want to be married to me anymore," she said flatly.

He chose to ignore that. He had to.

"I'm here for you," he said quietly. "I'll be your friend, if you want me to be. And I'll help you in any way I can. But I – I can't give you more than that, Bella. Not like this. It'll rip me apart."

Her eyes were very sad. He felt as though he was kicking a puppy.

She opened her mouth. He was terrified, absolutely terrified of what she might say, and so he cleared his throat loudly and stepped to the side, motioning to her.

"We should head back to the house," he said softly.

Stiffly, his wife nodded. Walking with her through the trees, he thought that somehow, despite their previous months of separation, she had never felt further away.

-x-x-x-x-

Please review.


	13. Chapter 12: Wonder

Thanks to addicttwilight2 and to all those kind enough to tell me their thoughts. Standard disclaimers apply.

-x-x-x-x-

and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you...

"i carry your heart", e.e. cummings.

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Twelve: Wonder**

Her body was humming next to his. She was trying so hard not to look at him, not to do what she so wanted to do and reach to touch his skin, but she felt stretched unbearably tight, as if at any moment the strings holding her together would break and she would drift from the surface of the earth.

She was so extremely aware of his every movement, every twitch, every shift of his body. She didn't know whether it was because he intimidated her so much or because she was so uncomfortable around people in general now, or whether it was an echo of that strange, terrifying feeling that clutched at her and refused to let go. She felt angry, at him and at herself, and she didn't know why. She was terrified, paranoid, every moment seeing shadows where there were none, and sure he'd run away – or be taken.

She didn't understand it, any of it, and she was so tired. It terrified her, how much she wanted to just curl so her back would meet his chest and feel his body spoon hers.

The silence was weighing more heavily on her every second. She chanced a glance at him.

"Where are we going?" she asked. She hated how small and lost her voice sounded.

He looked sidelong at her. "Back to the house," he said flatly.

She digested this for a moment.

"Didn't... weren't you leaving?" she asked timidly, watching as he huffed in frustration.

"Not anymore," he replied tightly, and she sensed to not push that any further.

Despite herself, she felt her body clench in discomfort upon sight of the white building. Her breathing accelerated and out of the corner of her eye she spied something in the trees, lurking...

"Bella?" she heard Edward ask in alarm, and belatedly realised that she was shivering violently.

Against her volition, her hand landed on his upper body and she hauled him behind her in a single, swift movement.

"It's not safe," she blurted, her breaths coming hard and fast. "It's not –"

Her stance and her grip on his arm restricted his movement. He felt as insubstantial as dandelion fluff in her arms.

She felt him hesitate, and then – one of his hands brushed hers timidly. His fingers grasped hers and he squeezed. She gasped at the warmth that suffused from that single point of contact.

"It's okay, Bella," he crooned, his voice low, placating her. "It's family. You're safe here."

"No," she whispered desperately, "it's not safe, you don't understand –"

His hand froze in hers. "What don't I understand?" he asked, his voice sharp.

She swallowed. "I... I don't know."

A tiny expressed breath fluttered at her neck and then he was leading her towards the house, his expression strained, his gait weary.

She wanted to tell him again – to tell him the dangers that lurked in her terrified mind, of the insecurity she felt and of her crushing need to protect him... but there, words failed her, and she was reduced to following as he led, cursing the mysteries of her silent brain.

-x-x-x-x-

When they arrived back, his family had assembled in the front room. One by one, they left the house. First Emmett and Rosalie, both of them uneasy and angry with the situation, but unwilling to go against his wishes now that he could actually form words again. Jasper lingered guardedly in the doorframe as his tiny sister hugged him tightly. Drawing back, she squeezed his hands in hers.

"It will be all right, Edward," she vowed fiercely. "I don't know how, or when, but this is the right thing to do, and eventually life will make sense again."

Tired of the ridiculous potency of his every emotion, he could only nod wearily at her.

Lastly Carlisle and Esme each embraced him, their thoughts worried, fearful, and at the same time, strangely optimistic. Words had not passed between them except a quiet "take as much time as you need, son," from Carlisle, but he gleaned so much comfort from their unexpressed love that he found it exceedingly difficult to let them leave.

Bella – whether mindful of his wish to speak to the family alone, or just uneasy to be in the same room as Jasper – had retreated upstairs. He took a moment and sat his body on a step, resting his head in his hands.

Now more than ever he could feel the duality of the situation tugging at him insistently. His every instinct was telling him to get up and run straight out of the house and not stop until he was very, very far away. Warning him that he was about to smash himself to pieces all over again and that it would be doubly hard to pick himself up afterwards. Screaming at him to not be a fool. To run, or else to go upstairs to the bedroom and systematically close himself off from the woman he knew needed him, to break her as thoroughly as she'd broken him and indulge in a kind of frenzied and depraved glory at the very act of destruction.

And still the quieter, saner voice spoke, reminding him of what life was like without her. Now that he had her back, he could see, with startling clarity, just how much her absence had shattered him. Not even the big things. It was easy to miss making love to his wife, easy to miss her kisses and the way she looked up at him just before she dropped into sleep in his arms. Anyone would miss those things about the person they loved, if they'd had them once and then had them taken away.

No – the things he missed were much more varied and insignificant. The way her eyebrows danced in her face, her entire body moving with her words, emphasising her meaning, conveying her emotion. The way her mouth would smile when she was teasing him – a quick flash of teeth she couldn't quite stifle. The way her hips moved as she walked. The freckles on her nose. The smell of her hair. That particular lilt in her voice, revealing to him that her small body was so full with love that she was trembling with the force of it...

The voice reminded him that without seeing and feeling those things every day, he was dead already. He was already crushed, was already a pathetic mess. She could do nothing further to him, so why not suck every drop of sweetness out of her presence, while she still deigned to bestow it on him?

Freesia and strawberries danced in the hallway, taunting him. He closed his eyes and inhaled, and then started up the stairs.

-x-x-x-x-

He found her in their – in his bedroom, standing with her arms wrapped around herself, in front of their wedding portrait. Then-Edward's arms rested on then-Bella's waist, lifting her to eye-level, the two of them grinning insanely, about to kiss. He could remember that moment with such clarity – her soft hands around his neck, her eyes promising devotion – that he inhaled sharply at the potency of it.

She sensed him then, but did not turn around. "I wanted to pick it up," she offered impersonally, "but I'm afraid I'll break it."

He moved to stand at her side. His voice was tender – trapped as he still was in that memory. "Do you remember the toast Charlie gave? He was so proud of you that day, Bella..."

She shook her head slightly. "I don't remember."

He was quiet for a moment.

"I'm sorry," he said eventually, shaking himself. "I... that was stupid." And he genuinely was sorry, and angry with himself for having slipped yet again. But another part of him was just angry with her. For giving him that moment, and then taking it away.

He felt her body sway towards his – felt her head bend as if to rest on his shoulder – and drew on all of his self-control to step away.

If she noticed, she ignored it. "What happened to them, Edward?" she asked sadly. "What happened to us?"

He sighed. "Does it matter?"

"You can't even look at me," she whispered. "Of course it matters."

He ran his hand through his hair. "I can't tell you what happened," he said bluntly, still watching the immortalised face of his innocent human wife. "I can't understand it myself. And I can't blame you for her mistakes," he added bitterly, pointing at the woman in the picture.

Her voice was very quiet. "I don't know her," she admitted.

His was hard. "I don't either."

"I don't know how I could ever have..."

"Bella. Please. Don't. Just don't." He closed his eyes and swallowed.

"Please tell me, Edward." He knew, without looking at her, that her lips were compressed, trying to hold back the swell of emotion gathering in her throat."Please. I need to know."

"I loved you. I thought you loved me. And you left." He said the words flatly, feeling another piece of him break away, as it did whenever he gave the events of their failed marriage voice.

"That's it?" Her voice was trembling now, and he could imagine his wife's eyes filling with tears, their brown depths magnified a hundred fold. He closed his own – wanting to preserve that image. Wanting to not be confronted by the dry-and-crimson-eyed Bella standing beside him.

"That's all you need to know," he whispered. Wanting to protect her. From herself, but most of all from him.

He felt her small fingers tug at his sleeve. He wanted to weep at the innocence of the gesture.

"I need to understand this, Edward," she said desperately, her voice hitching. "I... everybody hates me, and I don't know why. _I_ hate me. I... disgust myself."

This admission sat in the pit of his stomach like a rock, and it was that which finally broke the no-touching barrier he'd imposed between them. Without thinking, he spun towards her and took her face in his hands.

"Don't say that," he said fiercely, watching as her eyes closed. "Don't you ever say that."

"You hate me," she whispered sadly, "and I don't blame you. I must have been... I must have done so many horrible things to mess _them_ –" here she nodded towards the picture "—up so much."

He tucked her face under his chin, wrapping his arms tightly around her and rocking them back and forth. Ignoring the voices that screamed warnings. Ignoring them.

"Please forget about it," he implored her. "Please, Bella, this is not going to do us any favours."

She drew back, wrapping her arms around her torso. She looked as though she were trying to hold herself together.

Her lower lip stuck out by the tiniest increment as she turned her gaze back to the picture. He noticed, aching as he remembered how that same tiny gesture had always made him want to kiss her. It was utterly stupid, preposterous even for him, but he missed her. Even standing less than a foot away from her, he missed her. Having embraced his wife once, it was physically painful to him to let her go. Which, if he was honest with himself, was the main reason why he didn't want her touching him in the first place.

One of her long, slender fingers reached out to trace the shape of their heads behind the picture frame.

"We look so happy," she said quietly, to herself. "My hair was so long, it took Alice ages to pull it up like that..."

Something was wrong with that tense.

"Was?" he inquired softly. "Your hair _was_ that long? Surely it still is, Bella?"

She shook her head absently, still fixed on their image in profile. "I cut it," she informed him.

His chest was tight. He didn't know why. "You did?" he asked, doing his best to conceal his confusion under a layer of gruffness.

She glanced sidelong at him. "Does that upset you?" she asked in surprise.

He shook his head. He couldn't find words.

Impulsively, she reached for the bun at the back of her head and pulled her hair free. She bent at the waist, flipping the shiny mass over her face and fluffing it. For the seven millionth time, he froze in shock at the sight of his wife doing this – such a familiar gesture.

She straightened back up. He could almost imagine her cheeks flushing with colour as he looked her over.

Her hair fell softly to her shoulders. No longer weighed down by its own heaviness, it curled in loose loops and spirals. A few wayward strands clung to her face, and she screwed up her mouth and blew them away.

The style framed her face, softening the angle of her chin. The slight red that had always peeked out through the brown was intensified.

She looked... different. There was no other way to describe it.

His fingers reached out and ran through a shiny lock, watching it bounce into curl as he left it go.

"Do you like it?" she asked uncertainly.

"It's... different." He paused. "I don't like that it's different... but I like _it_."

She smiled, but her eyes were sad.

"How'd you do it?" he asked, curious now.

Her answer was quick. "With a knife." Her forehead furrowed in contemplation. "I _think_ Jacob helped," she added quietly.

"Bella... _why_?" he asked, wanting and not wanting to know.

She swallowed. "I'm not entirely sure."

He looked at her – really looked at his wife for the first time in months, and he noted the slight worry lines still creasing her forehead, the tiredness in her eyes, overlaid with a quiet sense of determination. She'd been through hell, too, he realised with a shock. Whether it had been of her own making, or of his, remained to be seen.

It made sense that she had wanted a change on the outside. It was obvious to him now that she had changed so much on the inside. His idealistic, naive girlfriend had entirely disintegrated, replaced by someone stronger, but still a beautiful mystery.

"It suits you," he said, and with a shock he realised it was true.

"Thank you," she said quietly.

She looked utterly wretched. He felt suddenly ashamed. He looked at the portrait of his young wife and compared it to the woman standing in front of him. Hardly anything matched up. She was an entirely different person now. Had he done that to her? Had he pressured her into something she hadn't been ready for, disregarded her need for a normal human life?

"Bella, I want to tell you..."

Her entire countenance brightened – her body leaned towards him.

"Yes?" she asked, her eyes alight with desperation.

"It... us. Our marriage, how it ended... it wasn't entirely your fault," he said gruffly.

Her breath caught in her throat, and she laughed. It sounded choked.

"No, Bella, I'm serious," he insisted. "I should have tried harder, I should have realised that you were unhappy earlier, I should have never forced you into marriage so young –"

She took two steps forward and shoved him. He stumbled backwards, shocked.

"Stop blaming yourself, for the love of all that's good and pure!" she cried, her words bubbling in sobs. "I _know_ I was horrible and I _know_ I wrecked our marriage, wrecked me, wrecked you, wrecked us... Edward, I can feel it all, the _guilt_, and I just don't know why... I can't reconcile loving you the way I do and treating you that way..."

He was frozen. He could barely move his lips. "Don't say that, Bella," he managed, his lungs squeezing painfully.

She approached him. He backed away, terrified.

"I love you," she said defiantly, then repeated it, over and over again. "I know I love you."

His chest suddenly felt like it was much too small to contain his heart. "Stop saying that," he all but snarled at her. "You don't even know what that means. You have no idea what you're saying."

Her hands reached for his and he evaded them. Again. Again.

"Edward, please," she whispered, her voice fraught. "Please let me make this right. Please –"

His nails dug into his palms. "Stop this," he ordered her, terrified. "Stop it. I told you, I can't do this. Why do you keep pushing?"

They halted, staring at each other. The room felt huge around them, the space crackling between them.

"I don't expect or deserve your trust," she whispered, "but I will do anything I can to earn it back."

He shook his head, over and over. His skull felt as though it were full of cotton wool.

"You don't know what you're saying," he repeated fuzzily, his mouth thick with longing.

She stepped closer to him. And then she mumbled something, and he felt his entire body prickle.

"What did you say?" he asked frantically, wanting to make sure he'd heard correctly.

She stared at him. "I carry your heart with me," she said softly.

He was frozen, transported. "La Basilique du Sacre Coeur," he whispered to himself.

She advanced slowly. "Paris," she affirmed, "on our honeymoon."

"You remember?" Disbelief, cold and crackling, momentarily robbed him of his cynicism.

She nodded. "That poem. I remember you reciting that poem for me on the steps," she said softly. Her hand grasped his sleeve, and then she was speaking and he was listening and he had no choice anymore.

"i fear no fate(for you are my fate, my sweet) i want no world(for beautiful you are my world, my true)..." Her arms snaked around his waist, her body steadily moving closer.

He was whispering the words with her, he realised as her head came to rest on his chest, their bodies finally connecting, mouthing words he'd cherished as his own personal rosary, words he'd whispered in her ear so many times during that honeymoon, moments of peace in a city filled with light...

"...this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart – i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)." They finished together.

He had no words.

-x-x-x-x-

Thanks for reading. Please review.


	14. Chapter 13: Return

Thanks to addicttwilight2 as usual and to everyone who reads and reviews. Standard disclaimers continue to apply.

-x-x-x-x-

Let this sad int'rim like the ocean be

Which parts the shore where two contracted new

Come daily to the banks, that, when they see

Return of love, more blest may be the view.

"Sonnet no. 56", William Shakespeare

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Thirteen: Return**

He felt the humming of her lips against the side of his throat before she actually spoke. The sensation threw him so violently into the past that he had to close his eyes for a moment to ground himself, and almost missed her words.

"Edward?" she asked quietly.

"Yes?"

"I'm scared."

His grip around her tightened infinitesimally and relaxed in the same second – the old adage to never hold her as tightly as he wanted running through his head.

"Me too," he admitted, closing his eyes.

"No," she insisted. He looked down at her as she drew back from him, her arms still around his waist but her worried eyes now piercing his. "I'm scared all the time, Edward. I feel... I keep thinking someone's watching us."

Gazing at her concernedly, he could tell how much this admission pained her.

"Nobody is," he assured her quietly, and in a habit long-neglected he raised his hand and tapped at his forehead. "Mindreader, remember? I would know if –"

"Not if they stayed out of range," she insisted, her eyes radiating fear. "They could watch and still stay out of range, couldn't they?"

He kept his arms around her, though her frame was locked now, stiff in his embrace and reminding him horribly of other days and nights when she had removed herself from him in precisely this manner.

"It would be next to impossible, Bella," he told her gently, willing her to relax. "Considering my gift, along with Alice and Jasper's, plus the increased sensitivity to noise and movement that comes with this life –"

She physically stepped back from him now, her body tight with tension. His arms dropped to his sides, horribly empty. He felt a familiar, panicky need surface, along with a quiet sense of self-loathing at how utterly pathetic he was.

"You're shaking," he declared, watching her carefully. He swallowed as something became dawned on him. "Bella – you need to hunt."

Immediately she shook her head. "No. No, Edward, please, not now. I can't – I'm not ready –"

"It's not a question of being ready, Bella," he intoned dully, feeling his body fall back to earth at the sick realisation that he needed to take his wife hunting. His stomach twisted, entirely uneasy. "It's what your body needs now. Isn't your... doesn't your throat...?"

He was unable to voice the monstrous reality. He watched, stricken, as her hand came up to cup her neck, squeezing her flesh almost brutally.

"I'm okay," she whispered, completely at odds with her physical reaction. Every line of her trembling body was telling him that she needed to hunt, and quickly. What was she waiting for? Any other newborn would have fled the house long ago...

"Did they feed you in Volterra?" he asked quietly.

She hesitated, then nodded quickly. "I didn't – I mean – they brought something in a glass," she admitted. Her eyes were downcast now – ashamed.

He could find nothing within him to comfort her with. How could he tell his wife not to feel disgust at something her body needed when he had suffered under the weight of that shame for as long as he'd been made? How could he tell her that there was nothing monstrous about the act, when he could feel the demonic side of his nature curling maliciously, spitting black fire into his throat and demanding blood?

Maybe, maybe if things had gone as he'd planned – if he'd changed Bella himself, as an act of love, as an acknowledgement that one lifetime would never be enough for them – maybe then he would have been able to soothe his wife's fears, to reconcile himself to what they were, to embrace his immortality because it had created hers... But the fact was that his wife had burned in a stone castle for days on end to be crafted into a creature at least as bloodthirsty as he was. He could not find any rhyme or reason in that.

He felt frozen, and he knew... he couldn't guide her, couldn't help her. He was just as helpless as she was, terrified out of his wits and not sure he could handle this – any of it. He was so far from the arrogant ass she'd married, barely standing upright, barely able to string two words together. How could he tell his wife how to deal with this life, when he himself had absolutely no idea?

"Edward," she pleaded, her hand reaching for his, "please, I don't want to hunt. I can't handle that on top of everything else. I can't, I just..."

He drew his hand back and away from hers, ignoring her appeal. He could feel himself clam up – could visualise the mask his wife so hated descending over his features – but could do nothing to stop it. She needed to hunt.

Her face was drawn, imploring, and so he focused on a point somewhere over her left shoulder. He could not comfort her, could not be so hypocritical as to act like he had any answers for her, but he could offer her this. It would not be fair to show her the full extent of his disgust. She would not understand that the feeling was not meant for her – that it was aimed entirely at himself.

"Do you know..." he began, choosing his words carefully. Again he reminded himself of what he had done, of the last time he had given himself over to instinct, of the innocent blood he had spilt. And he realised that he had no right to impose morals upon her that he himself had broken so extravagantly so many times. This, and all things, would have to be her choice. "Do you know if... the blood they gave you. Was it human?"

Her breath hissed into her lungs. Both hands were now cupping her throat.

"I don't know," she blurted, horrified. "I don't know, Edward, I... I... they gave it to me and I drank, I never thought about..."

He shook his head. She needed to understand that she would face no judgement from him, whatever her choice was.

"It's all right, Bella," he said gently. "I – what I'm trying to say is, you have a choice here. Just – Carlisle, the rest of the family... they have a special arrangement concerning their diet. Do you remember what that is?"

She nodded, watching him carefully. Her brow was furrowed.

"It is up to you whether..." he began, and was shocked when she interrupted him.

"Are you kidding?" she said incredulously. Her small body had straightened in indignation. "Are you seriously trying to tell me that it's okay if I want to go kill a few humans?"

He closed his mouth, and nodded. Once. Simply. And was shocked to hear her chest rumble with a low growl.

"Don't you ever say that again," she snapped, and he jumped at the very serious threat in her voice. "Don't you _ever_... My _god_, Edward, what the hell is the _matter_ with you?"

_So much_, he wanted to tell her, _so so much,_ but could not bring himself to say another word, reminded as he was how much better than he his wife had always been, how much more aware she was of what was decent and good.

And yet as that realisation dawned on him he was once more confronted with the utterly frustrating duality – because if Bella had not changed, if she had truly loved him, if she had always loved him, as she said, then how could she have left? Why? If she'd loved him as she swore she did, why hadn't she trusted him enough to tell him what had driven her to all she'd done?

He would surely break apart if he kept down this train of thought, so he simply swallowed and held out his hand to her. Her eyes were full of wariness, but she entwined her small fingers with his anyway.

"We... we don't have to go right this minute if you don't want to," he muttered, hating himself, but unable to bring himself to do what he knew was right and beg her to seek nourishment.

"Thank you." Her voice was very small.

He squeezed her hand. Trying to convey with his touch how sorry he was for everything. Wanting to tell her again how much he loved her, how little he deserved her. And, against all odds, hoping that once she regained her memories and truly knew him again, knew all he'd done and the myriad of ways he'd failed her, she would somehow still see enough in him to want to stay.

-x-x-x-x-

They stood motionless for a little while. Eventually her hand went limp in his and she drew away, sinking down to sit cross-legged on the thick carpet of his bedroom. He lowered himself to sit opposite her, their knees almost touching. He watched her very carefully as her face twisted in increasingly unfathomable ways.

"What are you thinking?" he asked eventually, unable to stand it anymore.

She drew breath, her hands rubbing circles at her temples. "I'm thinking... that I'm a complete failure," she ground out.

"Please don't say that, Bella," he breathed, pained.

She ignored him. "I feel like there's something in front of my nose and I just can't see it," she said, her voice one protracted groan. "This is so frustrating, I..."

"What?" His body leaned towards hers, seeking to reassure. He drew breath, and very carefully reached to brush his hand lightly against her shoulder. At his touch, she stilled. "What is it, Bella?"

"I don't know!" Her voice escaped from her throat in a sob, her hands clenched in fists, eyes wide and staring, unfocused, at his face. "I feel like I'm going to jump right out of my skin, and I don't know why... I feel so trapped here, I just want to..."

He felt his stomach coil in terror and fought to deny his immediate impulse to pounce on her and hold her so she'd never leave.

"You're free to leave here at any time," he said instead, feeling his body twist in rebellion against the traitorous words.

She looked at him. "That's not what I meant," she said, her tone surprised. "You... I don't want to leave you. Not ever."

He felt his fear returning, his entire being curling under the weight of it.

"You don't know that," he whispered, hearing the words as if from a great distance. "You... I know you remember loving me, Bella, and I don't doubt that you did, once, but something changed... you don't know how you feel now."

She was staring at him in disbelief. "You are still so patronising," she said, as if it was a revelation. "You still don't believe me, do you?"

His stomach spasmed. "I can't," he told her simply.

In an instant, she was on her feet and whirling to face the bureau. He watched in confusion as she reached out to grab the heavy frame of their wedding picture, and thrust it at him.

"_Look_ at her, Edward," she implored. "Just – just look. That doesn't change. That feeling – it doesn't go away. I'm – I'm still her, somewhere."

He shook his head sadly. "People fall out of love. It happens all the time."

"When will you stop believing that my feelings were somehow less than yours?" she hissed.

And then it happened. His wife, in her anger, tightened her grasp on the glass frame unconsciously, and with that simple motion, the parts her fingers had been holding powdered into nothingness. She yelped in surprise as the remainder of the picture dropped into floor. There was a resounding crash as the brittle glass covering their smiling faces splintered and then they were looking at the whole mess of glass and metal and paper on the floor.

"Oh god, I'm sorry," she babbled, crouching to pick the fragments up, then drawing breath and whipping her hands behind her back. She looked like a guilty child. He could imagine, so clearly, the fiery blush that would have swamped her face, once.

He smiled wistfully. "It's okay, love," he said gently, the endearment slipping out against his better judgement. He knelt beside her, and again his hand reached to touch her shoulder, reassuring. "You can't be expected to handle everything at once, not yet."

She wasn't listening, he noticed, her eyes trained to the floor. He watched her patiently, convinced that this refusal to meet his gaze was born of embarrassment... but no, there was fascination in her eyes, and distractedly he glanced downwards to see what had so attracted her attention.

He saw nothing. He bent slightly and picked the photograph out of the debris, flipping it glossy-side up and showing it to her. "See? No harm done."

She still wasn't watching her. He glanced again to the floor, confused. And his breath caught.

A scrap of paper, obviously once confined behind the portrait, rested innocuously among the shards of broken glass. His gaze darted back to his wife, who was still staring at it, her lips parted in fascination.

Realising that she was afraid to touch it lest it, too, crumbled to dust, he picked it up uncertainty. "Bella... what...?"

"Open it," she pleaded. Her voice was raw.

His hands were trembling. He couldn't understand why. A beat, and then he was staring at his wife's messy cursive, scrawled unsteadily across the slip of paper.

"_I am so sorry,_" he read aloud in disbelief, his voice shaking. She closed her eyes and spoke as he spoke, echoing the words he was saying. "_I can never tell you how sorry I am. I love you. That has never changed, will never change. Please believe that if I could have told you the reason for all of this, I would have, and that I could not have borne hurting you like I have for anything but to keep you safe. All of this will be a distant memory someday, and I will spend forever making it up to you. Ever your loving wife, Bella._"

He was trembling, clutching the paper so hard it was crinkling at the edges, staring at the words in her beloved handwriting. Feeling the ghost of his human wife reaching out to embrace him.

"Oh god," he choked, and looked at her. She was watching him carefully. "You love me," he said, and it was as if he was hearing it for the first time.

Her face crumpled, her shoulders shaking. "So much, Edward, so so much. I always have."

And finally he couldn't hold onto it anymore, could not sink into his cynicism, which was really just another form of cowardice. Finally he could not deny it, deny her, deny them.

He reached for her, pulling her light frame easily so she straddled his lap, their legs interlocking. He framed her face with his hands, turning it towards his, and he kissed her full on the mouth.

-x-x-x-x-

He kissed her, and it was their first time, all over again. She was melting, burning, trembling with the force of the feelings running through her. His mouth on hers, his hands on her skin were like nothing she'd ever felt, everything she'd ever wanted.

She knew how much he wanted this, could sense his desperate need to reconnect with her and make up for all they'd lost, but still he held back. One of his hands was clasped around her waist, holding her away from him by the tiniest inch. The other was rubbing slow circles into her back, soothing, calming, and she wanted to cry in frustration. She could feel echoes of memories whispering to her about other kisses that had turned her insides molten, other times he'd been ridiculously calm in the face of her desire, and she decided, there and then – no more.

Disregarding his careful grasp of her, she flung both of her arms around his neck and pulled him so there was not one inch of space between them. He gasped aloud as she squeezed fiercely him with both arms and legs, and joyfully she realised that he could not hurt her anymore, nor prise her away if she didn't want to go.

She felt his hand press into her back very slightly – a ghost of a touch, really – and broke the kiss long enough to whisper in his ear.

"I'm not breakable anymore, Edward," she breathed, watching him shiver. "You can't hurt me. Hold me tighter."

His arms wrapped around her and held her closely, one hand snaking upwards to bunch in her hair and guide her mouth back to his. She huffed in frustration, still feeling that hesitancy in his touch, that fear in his kiss.

She bit his bottom lip, and he yelped as the venom stung him slightly. He drew his head back and stared at her. Despite herself, she giggled at how scared he looked. His expression changed suddenly, and she drew breath at the playfulness – yes, _playfulness_ – that lit his features.

Then he was kissing her again, crushing her body against his, and she gasped as she realised that she'd finally gotten through to him.

-x-x-x-x-

Thanks for reading, please review.


	15. Chapter 14: Helpless

Thanks to addicttwilight2 and everyone kind enough to give me their input.

-x-x-x-x-

it may not always be so;and i say

that if your lips,which i have loved,should touch

another's,and your dear strong fingers clutch

his heart,as mine in time not far away;

if on another's face your sweet hair lay

in such a silence as i know,or such

great writhing words as,uttering overmuch,

stand helplessly before the spirit at bay;

if this should be,i say if this should be-

you of my heart,send me a little word;

that i may go unto him,and take his hands,

saying,Accept all happiness from me.

Then shall i turn my face,and hear one bird

sing terribly afar in the lost lands.

e.e. cummings

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Fourteen: Helpless**

His fingers ran haphazardly through the mess of his wife's curls, gently pulling and detangling. In response, she adjusted her head, snuggling deeper into the crook of his neck and placing a soft kiss against the point where his pulse had once beaten.

He closed his eyes and for a while he felt as though they two were floating through a haze of bliss. Bella's feet were twined about his calves, her small body curved to fit against his, her soft hand resting lazily on his chest. There were no words between them as of yet, but he could feel her small puffs of air against the skin of his throat, could sense her every movement, could have told her that the soft, lazy kisses she scattered routinely against his skin were timed in almost-perfect three-minute intervals.

He wound his fingers through her hair and wrapped his free arm around her waist, tugging her more securely against him. And he wondered if this longing, this ache to be as close to her as possible would ever let up. If he would ever feel like he'd had enough, that he'd like some alone time now, please.

No, he decided firmly as her fingers traced slow patterns above his heart. No, there would never be enough of this. And somehow the thought both terrified and soothed him.

"Edward?" she mumbled against his skin, her voice deliciously sleepy.

"Mm?"

She glanced up, and their eyes connected, and it didn't matter that hers were red while his were black. "I love you."

He swallowed. He felt as though she'd brushed a kiss against the worst of his pain.

"I love you too, Bella," he croaked, and bent his head to kiss her.

-x-x-x-x-

"I remember something."

She propped her chin up on her arms, which were placed across his chest. He ran his hand through her hair. Having been absent when she had changed it, he was determined to acquaint himself with this new style as quickly as possible. He liked it, he thought, he definitely liked it, the way it curled so softly and gently against her face, the way it stopped just at that place on her collarbone where he knew she loved to be kissed...

She swatted his chest lightly. "Did you even hear what I said?" she asked, her eyes alight with humour.

With effort, he focused his mind. "I'm sorry, love. What do you remember?"

She bit her lip, looked at him through her eyelashes, shyly. "I remember talking to you in school. For the first time. Properly."

_Hello, my name is Edward Cullen..._

"Ah yes," he laughed. "I'm afraid I was somewhat less than eloquent."

She smiled, her eyes moving over his face in a way that made him catch his breath.

"I don't remember it that way," she said softly.

He stroked his thumb along her cheekbone. "You've always thought more of me than I deserved."

She smirked at him. "Hello, pot. This is kettle. You're black."

He should possibly had been saddened, or irritated, that she was once again denying how deeply he esteemed her, but at that precise moment he was unable to feel anything but the joy bubbling in the pit of his stomach. So he chuckled with her, watching her face relax for the first time since she'd returned.

Their laughter subsided and they lay for a while in silence. Her hands on his chest felt as though they were electrifying him slowly in the best possible way. He stroked her hair, kissed each of her fingers, thinking thank you, thank you.

"Edward?" she asked, and he heard an increased sobriety in her voice.

"Mm?"

"Does it bother you that I might not ever get my memories back?" she whispered, staring at his chin.

His hand, which had been rubbing slow circles on her back, stilled.

"Sometimes," he admitted, exhaling in a sigh. "I can't pretend that I don't want to know the reason for all of this, Bella. I believe you, and I trust you, but I still need to know _why_."

He saw her swallow, knew his admission was tearing her apart, and hastened to relieve the sting of his words.

"I'm willing to wait," he said softly, watching her face. "I will wait for as long as you need me to, love. I do believe that you will eventually get your memories back... that's usually how it works. Whether you remember ten minutes or ten years from now, I'll be there."

Her face relaxed, and she smiled.

"It means so much to hear you say that," she said, beaming at him.

He grinned back on her, and bent to kiss her, but before he could a very unwelcome thought prickled at the back of his mind and he felt his every instinct whisper _danger_. Pulling Bella to sit at his side, he sat bolt upright in bed, his muscles humming, his mind whirring.

"What is it?" she asked, alarmed.

He shushed her, intent on figuring this out, on –

_Edward, I need to talk to you..._

And then hatred, pure and fierce, was washing across his body, and he was out of bed and bent in a defensive crouch, snarling, staring straight at the spot he knew the intruder would emerge...

Bella was beside him then, her fingers digging into his forearm brutally hard.

"What's wrong?" she cried, and when he turned to face her, he could see her face fall, utterly – could only imagine that his own was full of loathing.

"Jacob," he spat bitterly, "and his mate. They're coming."

-x-x-x-x-

Fully dressed now, and standing with his wife outside the house, and she was trembling and he knew he should comfort her, but all was focused on –

_Edward, I need to make sure she's all right..._

_You touch him, leech, even look funny at him and I swear to god I will rip you limb from limb..._

"Don't say anything," he ground out, not even looking at Bella. "Don't say anything to him. Let me handle this. Please."

He felt her fingers begin to entangle with his, but pulled his hand away, unable to deal with that particular distraction.

"It will be all right," he heard her whisper. "Jake is my friend. He's our friend. Edward, _he helped me._"

That was true, he knew it was true, and also knew that his hostility made absolutely no sense, but he could not stop his chest from rumbling with a low and predatory growl, could not ignore his every instinct which screamed that this man had once taken his wife away from him and might do so again.

He took a step forward, shielding her, and when she moved with him he flung his left arm across her chest to ensure that he was at least half a step in front of her. He was grateful when she didn't object. He didn't think he could have dealt with any argument from her, right now.

There – in the trees – the bright sun glinted off bronzed flesh. He stiffened, and, as Jacob and Leah appeared into full view, drew himself up to his full height and locked his body as if for impact. Behind him, he heard Bella draw a choked breath as their scents hit her, but could not turn his back on his enemies to check on her.

Wisely, the two mutts kept a large distance from him. He noted coldly that Jacob's arm was locked around his mate's shoulders, that his face was drawn and ashen and that his walk had a barely-noticeable limp to it, and that Leah was staring at Bella with the deepest expression of loathing he'd ever seen on a human face. A low growl rumbled in his chest in return, and his hand reached out and grasped his wife's in an iron-tight grip.

The silence between the four was heavy. He could hear Jacob deliberating as to what to say, but did not bother to attempt civility and break the tension, as he might have done, once.

Once more he was confronted with multiple flavours of thought. On one hand, the dog had helped his wife, possibly saved her life and brought her back. On another, Bella had run to this man instead of to him, Edward, in her time of need, and Jacob had taken her away to Volterra, and the thought of that made him want to beat the dog till he squealed for mercy. On a third, the only sense he could hope to make of the mess of the past year lay in Jacob's thoughts and memories, but on yet a fourth, he knew that on some level, Bella loved her Quileute friend, loved him deeply, and for that reason alone he wanted to tear him to pieces from pure jealousy.

So he was reduced to staring at this man he hated and owed his happiness to, unable to move in any direction, conflicted and torn, and scared.

Most of all scared.

Because, his traitorous mind whispered, because maybe there was another reason Bella left with this boy... maybe she'd not only loved him but been _in_ _love with him_... maybe she'd never stopped feeling torn between the two of them, not even after her marriage, their honeymoon... maybe she'd needed to indulge that side of herself before reconciling herself to the notion of eternity with he, Edward, and maybe, just maybe, they had...

Jacob cleared his throat.

"It's good to see you, Bella," he said softly. At his words, Leah started, and drew closer to him.

Edward chanced a glance back at his wife and noted that her lips were almost white.

"Jake," she said quietly. If Edward hadn't known better he would have believed her in danger of fainting.

He tightened his grip on her hand, keeping her slightly shadowed by his body. Still vacillating on whether he should rip Jacob's head from his shoulders or shake his hand in thanks, he addressed the mutt in a hard voice.

"What do you want?" His voice did not waver or betray anything of what he was feeling. He was grateful for that, at least.

Then the dog's eyes met his, and despite himself, Edward was shocked at what he saw there.

Jacob's eyes were tired. No – more than that – they were weary, they sagged under the weight of _too much_. They'd seen too much and done too much to fit in his still-youthful face. His thoughts, as they flooded into Edward's brain, suffered the same brutal burden. And that was his first hint, the first thing that prevented him from killing the mutt immediately. Jacob did not want to be there, as much or more than Edward did not want him there.

"I'm fulfilling a promise I made," he proclaimed quietly, and again Edward saw a shadow of hatred pass over Leah's face – heard her fervent wish that the love of her life was just a little less honourable.

"What promise is that?" Some of the venom had leached out of his voice as curiosity set in.

Jacob's gaze flickered between he and Bella, finally landing on his wife.

"You asked me," he said tiredly, "to come back here, when it was done, and explain as much as I was able."

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see that Bella's hand rested at her throat, squeezing as if she intended to choke herself.

"I remember," she whispered. He could hear the effort it took her to push the words from her lungs.

Jacob's dark eyes landed back on his own black ones, and slowly he began to speak.

"Months ago, Bella came to my house – our house, now," he amended, looking down at Leah with a smile, "and requested my help. She was upset, and crying, and begged me to help her. She told me that both her family and mine were in huge danger and that she was the only person who could stop their deaths."

His still-rusty management of his gift and Jacob's surprising control over his thoughts made it almost impossible for Edward to see where this was going. He gritted his teeth, dropping Bella's hand to rub at his temple in impatience.

"What was the danger?" he asked, somewhat less than politely, and again Leah bristled, her thoughts broadcasting such venomous hatred that Edward was surprised his face didn't immediately erupt in blisters.

Jacob gazed warily at him.

"She wouldn't tell me," he said, and his tone was almost apologetic. "She told me that the less people knew, the better, and that she couldn't risk you finding out from my thoughts."

His fists clenched and he compressed his entire body tightly. As a result, what had been meant as a roar of pure frustration at _still not understanding_ escaped from his lips as a mere hiss.

He was so wrapped up in himself and his own petty impotence that he did not notice Bella taking a step forward.

"Jake," she said, and her voice was full of the tears she couldn't shed, "Jake, they hurt you, didn't they?"

Jacob's mouth formed a hard, bitter line. He squared his shoulders and remained silent. Leah, noting his unwillingness to express his own hurts, turned to Bella and finally spoke, her eyes flashing.

"Yes, they hurt him," she said, and Edward could see what an effort it was for her to abstain from cursing his wife with every swearword she knew. "He went with you on this goddamned foolish trip, stood by you when you told him you wanted to go to _Volterra_, of all places – and don't pretend you didn't know what a risk he was talking by just setting foot inside that city! – and for a finish, ended up with a body full of broken bones for his trouble..."

She would have gone on, Edward knew, but for the fact that Jacob drew her gently into his embrace and murmured something unintelligible to her. And that still would not have stopped her but for the fact that in hurting Bella, whom Jacob still loved, she was also hurting Jacob.

He almost laughed aloud with the irony of it. From the first moment he'd met Jacob he had resisted the urge to maim and kill him, because his hurt would hurt Bella, and now Leah was doing precisely the same thing for Jacob. What fools love makes us, he thought bitterly. What utter fools.

The dog was speaking now, his voice grave and deep.

"When – the crux of this whole mess was that Bella had to go to the Volturi to be changed," he said, and the quietness of his voice did not in any way mask the disgust he felt for that act. "I don't understand why, or how, I don't understand any of it, and believe me, it went against every natural instinct to let her go, but she was so certain that it was the only way to save us all... and then, when she was – when that red-eyed maniac was changing her, he got carried away, and..."

"He would have killed me," Bella interrupted, her voice rushed and breathy.

Jake closed his mouth and nodded.

"You... you saved me. You jumped at him, you got him off me. And they almost killed you for it." Her voice was full of awe.

Jake nodded again. And Edward was faced, once again, with the crushing weight of all he owed this man.

"They wanted to kill me – thought they'd killed me," Jacob admitted, the carelessness of his voice belying the tremor beneath, "but the leader's gift didn't work on me, and so they didn't understand enough about us – didn't realise how quickly we can heal..."

Bella was trembling beside him, harder than ever. She took a step forward, and stopped. And for the first time in a long time, Edward knew what she was thinking as clearly as if he could have actually read her mind.

The stench of putrefying flesh and animal blood that emanated from Jacob and Leah was unbearable from where they stood. Bella could not quite hide her instinctive revulsion to it, and Edward knew her body was revolting against taking her any nearer to the scent that screamed danger.

At the same time, she was aware that she smelt the same, if not worse, to Jacob now – that her body had been altered to something completely alien and disgusting to him. Combined with this fact was Leah's presence, her protective stance, her clear hatred. Edward could tell that there was no way she would let Bella within a foot of her mate, and could tell that Bella knew this also. The door had finally been closed, and there was no way she could turn back now.

"Jake," she whispered helplessly, her hand reaching out to her best friend over the no-man's-land between them, "I can never tell you how grateful I am..."

_-I can never tell you how sorry I am – _

"...for all you've done for me, all you've given up, and... and..." Bella struggled for words, her voice thick and utterly sincere. "I won't... this is over now, you and I. You've done everything I could ever have asked for, and now... now you have nothing left to give. And I wish you... every happiness."

His wife glanced at Leah as she said this, and in that moment Edward could sense a silent \communication between the two women, a mutual acknowledgement.

There were no more words spoken. Jacob smiled sadly at them both, and, tugging at Leah's hand, disappeared with her from whence he'd come.

-x-x-x-x-

Thanks for reading. Please review.


	16. Chapter 15: Safe

Thanks so much to addicttwilight2, anaismark and icrodriguez for their constant encouragement, also to everybody who contacted me at one point or other to express their support and hope that the story would be continued. Standard disclaimers continue to apply.

-x-x-x-x-

I would wrap you in angels just to keep you safe.

"Lullaby", Martyrs & Poets.

-x-x-x-x-

**Chapter Fifteen: Safe**

He watched them leave. Watched and waited, his body stiff with tension. When they had disappeared from sight, he closed his eyes and focused his other senses on their movement – his ears sharpened to their soft footfalls. With every inhale and exhale, he smelled Jacob and Leah, sensed their presence around his home, and he knew that if he thought about it too much his overwrought mind would snap and he would bolt, with his wife, so that they were somewhere – anywhere – else.

When a few minutes had passed, he allowed himself to relax, minutely. Some part of him knew that they were far away by now, out of the area and out of their lives. He flexed his hands briefly and opened his eyes, searching for his wife.

A jolt of panic flew through his body when he registered that she was no longer beside him.

He wheeled around, a wordless cry of protest erupting from the centre of his chest, and it was happening again, he was alone, Bella had left him, she'd –

"Edward?"

He spun again and saw her, curled into a ball near the trunk of a tree. She had folded into herself so absolutely that his eyes had skittered straight past her.

For a moment, he simply watched her watching him. Her arms were clenched around her stomach, her knees drawn up as if to protect her heart, and he had the very real sense that she was trying to literally hold herself together.

Then everything that Jacob had imparted finally hit home, and he felt a wave of emotion so intense that he felt his chest would surely crack open. Anger and frustration and anguish and confusion swirled to form a mass of pain so toxic that he felt physically ill, felt his dead heart struggle with the weight of it all, and he had the very real urge to crumple where he stood.

Watching her, watching Bella, his wife, his world, he told himself firmly that she couldn't handle that – that one of them had to pull it together, had to stand strong, show no weakness... and then the side of him that still clung so firmly to cynicism and brutal reality checked him, told him that Bella was not, in fact, his wife, that he was a fool and that he should walk away while he could still operate his limbs.

Bella curled up even further under his scrutiny, her arms wrapping around her knees, her bottom lip caught firmly between her teeth. The insecurity of the gesture left him gasping for air, his hand going to his throat as if to tear at the phantom constriction he felt.

He closed his eyes and swallowed deeply, trying to gain some modicum of control. It didn't work. Still the battle raged on within him, and he vacillated, torn, between alternate states of reality.

He loved this woman, but he hated her too. He wanted to repair what they had lost, but equally, some dark part of him wanted to see her suffer. He wanted to have faith, wanted to forgive, but still his inner demons snapped viciously at him, snarling warnings.

He wanted no part in that ugliness but he could not banish it completely.

He could feel himself swaying where he stood.

Most of all, he just wanted it over. Just wanted some rest, some peace. He needed some respite from this burden, this knot their lives had formed, he needed to be numb for a while, to not feel...

A warm hand slipped into his own, small fingers squeezing reassuringly. He opened his eyes and looked down, fascinated.

Bella stood before him, having uncurled from her protective position. She was watching him carefully, as if waiting for something.

He let his hand lie limp in hers. He could not muster up the energy to even acknowledge her gesture with a nod. He both loved and hated how much better he felt when she touched him, and the constant, exhausting dichotomy was ripping him to shreds.

_Tired. I'm so tired._

"I know," she whispered, her voice very small and lost.

His every movement felt sluggish. Air sighed lazily into his body and back out. He blinked, and it seemed to take forever.

Her dark eyes looked into his, and her expression seemed to clear. Her hand squeezed his again.

"Come," she said quietly, and he followed her, obedient as a child.

She led him through the house, up the stairs and into his bedroom, where her gentle hands removed his pants and his heavy sweater. Lifting his limbs so that she could manoeuvre the material off his body took up all his energy, and so he didn't question her motives. She removed her hands from him to shuck her own jeans down her legs, and he watched listlessly.

She coaxed him onto the bed with her, and when she was lying on her back, propped by pillows, she guided him so that his cheek rested against the soft cotton of her t-shirt, over her heart. She took his hands and moved them so that one locked around her torso, moulding her to him, the other resting on the plane of her stomach. Her bare legs tangled with his. One of her hands stroked through his hair, her nails softly scratching his scalp – the other rubbed concentric circles between his shoulder blades until he relaxed entirely and allowed her to feel his full weight.

She murmured to him, and her melodic voice washed over him. His brain was still too frantic to focus entirely on anything and so he only gained snatches of meaning – but what he did catch made his heart swell and catch in his throat, his eyes prickling with tenderness and thankfulness. Gradually his breathing loosened and became deep and rhythmic, the thick band in his chest relaxing somewhat, and he sucked air down to the very bottom of his lungs in gratitude.

She gifted him with fragments of lullabies and soft gentle songs, pieces of poetry and promises of love, of better things to come. Soothed by her words and by her presence, he watched the sun spear the sky with radiance as it set.

Lying there in her arms, just for a little while, he believed that everything would be okay.

-x-x-x-x-

Her hands on his body stilled, her voice stopped.

She shook him slightly. "Edward?" she asked, with the air of trying to wake him from a deep sleep.

He opened his eyes, stretched a little, looked up at her. When he saw her darting eyes, her tightened mouth, he roused fully. His back arched and he raised his body over hers, protectively.

"What is it?" he asked sharply, already listening.

"I think... I think someone's coming," she whispered, a hint of fear in her voice. "I think... your family?"

In a fluid movement, he was at the window, scanning the forest for any sign. He noticed, marvelling, that the sun was high in the sky again. He hadn't realised how long they'd been laying there. It had felt like such a suspension of reality that he was utterly and ridiculously surprised that time hadn't stopped.

"I don't see anything," he said, his body tensed. "They're not supposed to be back for days. Alice said –"

And he was brought up short by a knock at their bedroom door.

He wheeled around, aghast.

Now he could hear what he'd failed to notice before. Six rivers of thought gushed suddenly forth in his brain, and he winced disbelievingly. Bella was right – his entire family had entered the house, were gathered in the living room. How – _how_ had he not noticed?

Alice had evidentially tired of waiting for a response. The door flew open, and he gasped in shock as he felt a tidal wave of anger emanating from his tiny sister.

She said nothing, only glared at Bella briefly and then swung her eyes towards him. He could guess that she was attempting to communicate with him, but could not make out a word of meaning. Her thoughts flowed unstoppably, a current of incomprehension, and he was swept away by it.

He gripped his head, utterly stunned. He'd known that his gift wasn't working properly for him, known that he was too distracted, too utterly broken apart to steer his way through the subtleties of mind-reading, but until this moment he hadn't realised just how far he'd let it get away from him.

Alice's mind was more than capable of following several different strings of thought at once, as was every other mind in the house. It was like listening to multiple radio stations. He would zone in on Alice's furious inner diatribe just to get distracted by a snide remark from Rosalie or a worried plea from Esme. The resulting mishmash pounded relentlessly through his brain. _So this is what a headache feels like,_ he thought, horrified.

Alice's frustration filtered through. _Focus!_

He shook his head at his sister helplessly. He felt like a fish on dry land, struggling to breathe.

Her gaze swung back to Bella again. His followed, and he swallowed deeply as he saw his wife trembling under the inexplicable fury emanating from her sister-in-law.

When it came, Alice's voice was tight, unrecognisable. "Living room. Now," she hissed, and spun on her heel to depart without them.

-x-x-x-x-

There were moments, in this new life, where the absolute strength and power of her body infused her through with invincibility.

She remembered how she had destroyed nearly everything she touched, her first few hours – remembered the gritty dust beneath her fingers as lamps and doorknobs and bookshelves had crumbled like pieces of wet biscuit under her careless hands.

She had looked at her new limbs then with a dawning awareness, finally realising that she was, in all probability, the most dangerous person on the planet at that particular moment.

That was one kind of strength. The other came at the most unexpected moments, with the softest, gentlest gestures.

Watching her hands weave through her husband's thick thatch of hair as he lay against her, allowing her to comfort him – the sense of pride, of ability that had led to a quiet feeling of inner fortitude, that had made her straighten her spine a little, made her hold her head a little higher.

During those moments of peace with Edward – during all moments of their joint solitude, in fact – she could really believe that the mess she'd created was fixable, that she would survive, that she would heal while mending Edward, that they would emerge at last as equals, forged by fire.

Then, invariably, something else came screaming her way, and she was reminded of just how hopeless the entire situation was. Reminded that she was now reaping what she'd sown.

Now, downstairs in the white house she could remember loving, listening to Jasper and Edward scream at each other, watching their jerky, stressed movements, cowering on a chair in the corner as the rest of Edward's family surveyed her with tightened masks, she was terrified. Weak, and helpless, and terrified.

She knew what the Cullens were trying to do – what they'd been trying to do for the last six months. In the end, of course, the bonds that had formed between Edward and his family over eighty years were much stronger than the threads of brittle loyalty they'd ever felt towards her.

Her familial threads had snapped, and now the others were once more trying to close ranks, to protect the man they all loved from further harm at her hands.

She knew that Edward was holding on as best he could to his self-control, trying as hard as possible not to punch Jasper, not to catch him and throw him through a solid brick wall, and she knew that Jasper, too, could sense this. She wasn't surprised, then, that he spoke as though she could not hear him, that he gestured to her without even looking at her, that his tone was firmly, carefully blank, as though they were discussing a once-beloved dog that had turned rabid and was now no longer wanted.

She understood it – knowing that if Jasper displayed any hint of outright hostility towards her, Edward would snap – but that didn't mean she had to like it.

She tried to concentrate, tried to ignore Alice's stony eyes boring into her.

"...do you know, Edward?" Jasper bellowed, his arms waving. "How do you know that she's for real?"

Her husband's eyes darted to her, then, and she ached to see the uncertainty there. He looked so much like a lost little boy, and she gazed fiercely back at him, willing him to see the truth in her eyes, willing him to remember.

His shoulders slumped, then straightened – as though he'd shrugged a burden off, then immediately picked up another. "I just do," he answered, his body tilted towards Jasper, his eyes never leaving hers. She swallowed, feeling the seed of their connection grow firmer, marvelling at his faith.

Her one-time brother-in-law paced back and forth, his hands gripping at his hair. A part of her noted, with interest, that she had never seen him lose so much control before. She was reminded that this was a man who routinely dealt with the entire spectrum of human emotion, and wondered briefly at the added strain he must have been under, to be so agitated.

"It isn't good enough, Edward," he groaned, his back flexing. "I do not feel a damn thing from her, did you know that?"

She felt a jolt of surprise and gasped, clearly shocked. Jasper's honeyed eyes flew to her face for the first time since they'd entered the room, and he snorted in derision.

"Not even that," he drawled. "Either she's the best actress in the world, or she's been transformed into a cold, callous machine – no, actually, not even cold or callous, I could at least _sense_ that – or she's purposefully blocking me..."

Edward's eyes swung back to his brother's, and she could see traces of doubt begin to line his features. "She could never block you before," he mused, and Bella froze.

Jasper sensed victory. "Exactly, Edward! Which makes me think that she's got to be doing it consciously, she's got to know, to understand, which means –"

No, she couldn't bear to hear what it meant.

She bowed her head, feeling a sudden stab of nostalgia for the mane of hair that had once served as a shield for her face, and worked to block the sound from her ears.

_here is the deepest secret nobody knows..._

She closed her eyes and dove headfirst into the flash of memory she'd had earlier – watching European lights twinkle outside of their Parisian window, feeling the silken fabric of the sheet that Edward had swaddled them both in against her cheek, his lips brushing her ear as his sweet breath wafted around her, whispering words of devotion, of love everlasting – stolen from a long-dead poet, but none the less true for that.

She could feel it all as if it were still happening – feel the sting of now-non-existent tears in her eyes as she swallowed and leaned back against the man she loved, her heart too full for words. She could feel his arms flexing around her, as if longing to hold her closer, tighter, though their bodies as connected as it was possible to be.

She could feel the over-arching frustration that they could never and would never be close enough, feel the music that he wrung out of her body reach its crescendo, feel the thud of her head meeting his shoulder as her eyes squeezed shut and her body dissolved, feel the rise-and-fall of his chest at her back as he groaned aloud with all she made him feel.

_i carry your heart... i am never without it..._

She opened her eyes, startled and embarrassed to find herself back in the present, with the eyes of seven vampires staring at her critically. If it had still been possible for her to blush, she would probably have been visible from Canada.

She bit her lip as her eyes found her husband's, searching their sorrowful depths for any indicator, any sign that he knew what she felt, that he could somehow tell where her mind had taken her. Edward stared at her for a moment, his brow creasing, before turning away and continuing his argument with his brother.

Their Parisian honeymoon seemed to recede back even further into their history as she watched his back flex. So close and still so far away.

She felt the sting at the back of her throat that had always precipitated tears, and closed her eyes, quickly – knowing that she was incapable of actually shedding them didn't mean that the habit of concealing them faded away.

Inhaling deeply, the scents of the people she'd once called her family swirled around her, pushing the last vestiges of her bittersweet memory back. Sandalwood and lily-of-the-valley, warm caramel and cool mint, salt and citrus and a thousand other subtle hints that the English language had no words for...

Then the air in the room changed, and she inhaled a gulp of apple and iris and something else – something that was so light and delicate, so feminine and fresh, that its fragrance made her smile without thinking or knowing why.

She opened her eyes to seek the source of the scent, and with a start, she met Rosalie's gaze.

Automatically she flinched, expecting animosity, but strangely saw none of it evident in her sister-in-law's eyes. Rather, they were calculating as they appraised her – not with disdain, as had happened so often, but with seemingly genuine curiosity.

She bit her lip and curled further into herself, and felt as though she were watching something very important happen from miles and miles away as Rosalie's eyes widened. She could almost see whispers of suspicion and dawning comprehension begin to braid together, forming a ladder that led to a place she was somehow instinctively afraid of...

She saw Jasper halt and swing around to observe their interaction, saw Edward stiffen and draw breath as if to reprimand his sister, saw the rest of the family furrow their brows, excluded as they were from what was happening. She wanted to scream, to flail her arms or otherwise distract them all from the thing she could feel coming for her, the thing that would sweep her up and carry her away...

And then Rosalie herself was standing directly in front of her, then crouching down to meet Bella's eyes, and her hand as it touched hers was soft.

Bella could only gaze at her – her usual veneer of haughtiness had vanished and the surprising gentleness that took its place gave her the appearance, more than ever, of an angel among immortals.

Rose leaned even closer, the curtain of her golden hair and the sweet scent of rosy-cheeked apples excluding everything else from her mind, and Bella fleetingly felt like a child in the arms of its mother.

"Who are you trying to protect, Bella?" she asked softly, kindly, and she drew Bella's hands, previously clasped so tightly over her abdomen and the vast emptiness she could feel inside, into her own.

More words, more yelling, more tumult in the house and in her head, but Bella couldn't look away, hypnotised as she was by Rosalie's actions. As one in a daze, she saw Rose's lips moving, shaping words.

"I don't want to hear it," she said suddenly, and yanked her hands away. "Stop it, Rose, stop it right now!"

But Rose's fingers were once more laced with hers, and her hands were drawing Bella's own away from her ears, and despite the fact that Bella was so much stronger than her, she let her do it.

Rose's thumbs swept over her knuckles, and the tenderness of the gesture made her breath catch in her throat, made her look up into surprisingly sad golden eyes.

"You were pregnant, weren't you, Bella?"

And her day of reckoning had finally come, the answer was there at her lips and she couldn't run or hide or avoid it anymore, she had no choice but to say it.

"Yes."

-x-x-x-x-

Thanks for reading, please let me know what you think.


	17. Chapter 16: Denial

I'll say it straight out; this chapter is probably going to annoy the bejeesus out of some of you. However, I did feel that this needed to come first, and in all fairness, there is no way that I can possibly drag this out much further, right?

Thanks to all who read and review. Special thanks as always to anaismark and addicttwilight2, my wonderful prereaders, and to icrodriguez and amuse1 for their constant encouragement. Standard disclaimers continue to apply.

-x-x-x-x-

So farewell thou, whom I have known too late

To let thee come so near.

Be counted happy while men call thee great,

And one belovèd woman feels thee dear...

Here's no more courage in my soul to say

'Look in my face and see.'

"A Denial", Elizabeth Barrett Browning

-x-x-x-x-

He was arguing with his brother – ostentatiously giving Jasper his full attention, while, in reality, only half-listening.

Of course, all immortals were gifted with heightened senses that allowed them to adeptly perform a variety of mental functions at once, but Edward himself had once been gifted even beyond this – more than able to carry on a full conversation with one person while listening intently to the thoughts of another across the street.

Now, however, with the seeming disintegration of his gift, voices flickered in and out of his head rapidly, and he was finding it very difficult to listen to Jasper's frustratingly legitimate worries while at the same time being affronted by the interruptions of five other people every second.

Alice was as she had been for the past six months – worried, angry, afraid that her faith in her sister-in-law had been unfounded. Carlisle, too, was reserving judgement on Bella, his entire being praying solely for Edward's redemption. Esme – he frowned, concentrating intently – Esme seemed to be worrying about Bella, wondering how she was coping, wondering if she was following their way of life... and Rosalie – Rosalie...

His head whipped around.

Rosalie, too, was focusing on his wife, taking in her posture, her appearance, her seeming terror.

Edward's protective instincts flared, a growl rumbling in his chest as he remembered his sister's cynical attitude towards his wife's actions, remembered how she'd taunted him, how she'd so cruelly told him to _get over it, already_, as though Bella's disappearance had been a foregone conclusion, one he should have been readying himself for all along...

But no, he noted with surprise, his spine softening, Rosalie wasn't being scornful, or hostile, or dismissive in her thoughts of Bella. But nor could he understand exactly what she _was_ doing.

Her thoughts were misty, disbelieving as they catalogued Bella's rigid posture, as they wondered and hypothesised and dismissed themselves, yet continued to circle, round and round...

Suddenly Rosalie's musings seemed to bunch together and reassign themselves as she compared Bella's present attitude with what she remembered of another woman, dark-haired, whose face was hazy but whose voice was gentle as she cooed to a small child, its blonde curls spilling out from under a lacy white bonnet.

And Edward could only stand, as though turned to stone, as his sister reached the conclusion – the _impossible_ conclusion – that Bella was... his wife was...

He dismissed the thought almost as soon as it entered his head. It couldn't be. It was insane. Rosalie was _insane_. He couldn't father a child, so Bella couldn't _possibly_ have been...

But his mind was racing now, doing laps inside his skull, pounding him relentlessly with images from after their honeymoon – from that place, that time that he never wanted to revisit.

Bella asking him, politely, her eyes focused at some point over his shoulder, to let her sleep alone in their bedroom. The snick of the lock in the door as he left – the thud of the window latch slamming shut. Not just one night, but two, and then three, and finally so many that he didn't even bother trying anymore.

And when he'd asked, she'd told him she was _cold_, constantly cold, that their bed was too small, that he woke her up when he moved during the night – even though for weeks now all he'd done was lie there and watch over her, afraid even to sling an arm around her in case she rejected him even as she slept.

And when he'd refused to swallow these excuses, when he'd pushed for the real reason, she'd yelled at him – told him that she put up with his constant clucking during the day, and to do it at night as well was more than she could handle... and finally he'd withdrawn, quietly, another piece of him dying.

When she had finally left him, he'd been unable to move past the all-consuming pain of that single action. His mind, protecting itself, had focused entirely on the fact of his wife's departure, while ignoring the memories of the months preceding it. Likewise, when she'd returned, all that had happened between them was kept at bay – he'd simply been too busy to think about it.

Now, as he reeled in his living room, watching Rosalie interact with his wife, the memories of their ill-starred marriage gushed forth in his brain, and he was pounded with wave after wave of sickening heartbreak.

Bella turning away from him. Not just sexually – not even just flinching at the everyday expressions of love he'd chosen to communicate through touch – but turning her back from his very presence. He couldn't count the number of times he'd enter a room just to watch her leave it. Couldn't count how often she'd flinched, physically flinched when he'd moved just a step too close, as if her human instincts, so long dormant, were now resurfacing with a vengeance and warning her away from a dangerous predator.

Bella rebuffing her mother, her father – being so physically _not present_ that both had eventually withdrawn, silent and confused. It had been months since they had rung, though Edward had occasionally received a worried email from one or the other. More than anything, this – them worrying about their daughter so much that they would contact her husband, whom neither of them fully approved of – had proved to him that Bella's behaviour was not imagined, or exaggerated, on his part.

Bella rebuffing _Alice_, shrugging away from her quick, soothing gestures, and on one memorable occasion, yelling at his sister, telling her that she wasn't a living doll for Alice to manipulate.

Alice, still inexplicably blind without her gift, baffled and hurt, had caved to her wishes and for the most part had left Bella alone. And from that day forward, Bella had given up on almost every feminine ritual. She'd gone for days without showering, letting oily residue build up in her hair and on her skin, living in sweatpants and turtlenecks – however hot the weather.

His mind snapped to the present as he witnessed Rosalie hunch down, the position making her long, graceful body almost awkward, and whisper to his wife questioningly. Bella shook her head, her hands flying up to cover her ears.

He struggled to remain focused, but that gesture called to mind other memories, too many to ignore.

Another sharp wave swept over him as he remembered his wife, glassy-eyed, exhausted, her face chalky and her eyes empty as she sat in front of their television eating cereal straight from the box.

She'd spent days, and then weeks like this – slumped on the couch, eating stodgy convenience food, and of course he'd noticed the difference it had made to her once alarmingly frail figure – of course he'd noticed his wife's hips widening slightly, her silhouette becoming more womanly.

Ironically her weight gain only served to make her even more desirable to him – it had seemed to cement her more firmly in her body, and had he still been allowed to touch her, he knew he would have worried less about the possibility of her snapping in half. He'd watched, admiring, as her breasts and hips gained a lushness that they had never had before – he'd marvelled at the healthier curve of her arm, the way the bones in her face had lost their sharpness.

As the weeks went on, however, he'd realised that while his wife's body had become more robust, the signs of her suffering still could not be denied. Without Alice around to insist on such things as conditioner and curling irons, her hair lost the healthy shine that had once dazzled him, her skin had become pasty as she'd turned her face from the light, and her once-rich eyes had flattened and became dull as she struggled with whatever private hell she was going through.

She'd cried. Every day. Sometimes multiple times a day. And then she'd denied it, lying blatantly when he'd _known_, any fool would have known but _especially_ Edward, who'd been able to smell the salt tracks on her cheeks, able to sense the blood collecting under her puffy eyes.

And, as a prickling terror crawled over his skin, the final nail in Edward's coffin slammed home, and he remembered how his wife's posture – never particularly straight to begin with – had seem to curve inwards, her shoulders rounding, her hands constantly hovering about her middle. She'd taken to sleeping in a tight ball, curled into herself like a prawn. When she'd sat she'd wrapped her arms around her thighs, hugging her knees to her chest.

At the time, he'd noted that particular change, deduced sadly that she was probably trying to protect herself from him. Never had he thought that maybe she was trying to protect someone else, as well.

And that tender double-stroke of expectant mothers – back and forth twice, over their abdomens, that unconscious gesture he'd seen so often... yes, he could see his wife's fingers, swollen by heat and lassitude, passing over her softened stomach, back and forth, so lovingly that he could almost imagine them stroking the head of a small child instead.

Bella's voice broke through his thoughts, and he looked up – shocked that his wife and his sister had not moved. Shocked that only a few seconds had passed – that the only change had been within himself.

His wife was shaking her head, pleading with Rosalie to leave her alone, holding her palms over her ears like a frightened child, and again a snarl built in his chest. He started towards them, and then staggered to a halt as Rosalie's voice murmured again, and his wife answered: "Yes."

Nothing, absolutely nothing. For seconds, turning into minutes. Complete silence – in his head, in everyone else's head.

Then fear rose like a great flapping thing in his chest, and he gasped for breath as his throat squeezed, his hands clenching and unclenching as his body panicked. He felt as though his skin was humming, vibrating minutely with every tremor that passed through his mind, and he gritted his teeth to keep from moving – because he was absolutely sure that if he moved, he would run, and if he ran he might never stop.

He couldn't breathe. Couldn't think. Couldn't look at her.

And then the old voice crept back into his head, spitting poison, and the thought was there and he couldn't stop it. _Was it mine? It couldn't have been mine. I can't father a child – I am unnatural, a dead thing. But if not mine, then whose? Was it Jacob, after all, after everything? Is that why she ran? Because she was afraid of my reaction when she gave birth to puppies?_

He struggled silently, his body bowing in the middle, threatening to jack-knife under the pressure.

He felt his resolve not to break crack a little around the edges, and then a blanket of calm swept over him, engulfing him from head to feet. He drew a deep breath and focused, and somehow the room became sharper around him as his senses realigned with Jasper's help.

Dimly he realised that Carlisle was by his side, one of his arms around Edward's neck, his fingers gripping his opposite shoulder tightly. That small demonstration of his father's unconditional love and support somehow gave Edward the strength he needed to straighten, and stand, and listen.

Bella's eyes were screwed shut, her face contorted into an expression of such utter anguish that Edward flinched momentarily. Her body, too, had bowed at its centre, and she slumped forward, her elbows on her knees, her hands clasped over her ears as if she couldn't believe what she was hearing.

Rosalie kneeled before her in a position that was oddly maternal. One of her hands rested at the back of Bella's head, her fingers combing back and forward through the messy brown locks at the base of her skull. Her other hand rubbed Bella's kneecap through her jeans.

Edward was shocked. Though he had lived for over ninety years with his sister, and though he had had full access to her mind during that time, he had never glimpsed this alter ego of hers – had never imagined that behind Rosalie's frosty exterior lay a person who was both willing and capable of giving this level of comfort to a woman who was, in effect, a stranger.

Rosalie's voice was tender, and it cooed at his wife, promising Bella that it was all going to be okay – telling her the reassuring little lies that she'd always blankly refused to gift Edward with.

"Bella?" she asked, with another squeeze to her former sister-in-law's knee. "Bella, can you look at me?"

Bella's head lifted. Edward couldn't see her face from his vantage point, and by the time he had moved she had once more closed her eyes.

"Tell me what happened," Rosalie entreated quietly.

Bella shook her head once, her lips set in a hard line.

"I don't remember," she said obstinately, and like one in a dream Edward saw how her body coiled into itself even more, and knew that she was lying – to him, and maybe to herself.

And that proved to break it, the whole sorry mess his body had locked him into. He couldn't handle any more webs of deceit, any more false hope, any more whispered promises in the night that splintered come morning.

He just wanted to know, one way or another. He didn't think that was too much to ask.

He moved to stand in front of Bella, somehow managing to elbow an indignant Rosalie out of the way.

He looked down at his wife. Her eyes were still closed, and this angered him, and made him even more convinced that she was purposefully hiding information that he had a right to know.

He'd meant to speak softly, to cajole her into admitting it, but somehow his words came out in a snarl. "You do remember, Bella. You do remember. And you're going to tell me, right now, or so help me god I will walk out of here and never come back."

Moments ago he'd been murderous with rage that she refused to open her eyes. However, when he got his wish, when her eyelids cracked and she looked up at him, he was utterly, spine-chillingly horrified. Though the brown had been replaced by red, though her preternatural skin showed no trace of the worried lines that had strained her face when he'd last seen his human wife, nonetheless her eyes held a frighteningly familiar emptiness in their depths.

He swallowed hard, reliving the sense of his wife being here but not here, Bella but not Bella. A tiny part of him wondered whether this act was actually real – whether she was actually able to disassociate that thoroughly, and if so, where his wife went when this stranger took her place.

As horrible as it sounded, he preferred to believe that her soul was screaming inside her skull, battling to get out – that it took a tremendous amount of effort to erect this cold facade of hers.

"I don't remember," she said, her voice monotonous, but... not quite. Edward didn't know whether she had just fallen out of practice or whether she had finally reached the end of her rope, but either way, he could hear fault lines in her voice that he knew she hadn't intended to put there, and he knew that if he pushed just a little harder her mask would crack and all of her secrets would come spilling out.

"I know you remember. You just don't want to tell me. Why don't you want to tell me?" He was doing his best to be patient, but despite his efforts his voice still sounded somehow bestial – betraying that in this moment he truly felt more animal than man.

More fault lines etching across her face, more signs that she was struggling, with all her might, to hold back, and slipping a little more with each passing second.

"I don't know what happened," she repeated obstinately, and then his hands were on his wife's shoulders, and he was clenching his fingers and shaking her – just a little, for him, but enough that if she'd been human her head would have whipped back and forth like a doll's.

"Edward, son." Carlisle's voice, full of rebuke, broke through his consciousness – his hand grasped Edward's shoulder. In one of those blinding about-faces that he'd so recently become acquainted to, he dropped his hold on his wife as though her skin had flashed white-hot, horrified with himself. He had a temper, and he knew it, and at this point he was certain that he'd taken just about all a man could take and remain sane, but still, he'd promised himself that he'd never willingly hurt his wife, never raise a hand to her in anger...

Still, as he looked down at her, the monster snarling in his chest would not let him apologise. He looked at his father, and Carlisle, seeming to understand, dropped his hand and moved away.

He straightened and turned his back to her, crouched in the corner as she still was. The faces of his family blurred together – he ignored them. He didn't know whether to run or to stay, to seek comfort or to reject companionship, and the constant back-and-forth was so wearing that he could feel his body shifting, stirring, moving infinitesimally in one direction, and then the other.

A dry gasp broke from behind him. He whirled around, staring down at Bella once more. Something was stirring behind his wife's eyes, some sadness etching lines across her face as she stared at him.

"You're going to leave me," she said sadly, and he couldn't help himself – he laughed out loud.

"Me, leave _you_? You're afraid of _me_ leaving _you_?"

His voice was scornful, and he could see her flinch. He felt almost drunk with power, to see her react in this way to his words – more than she'd done in months.

Her head dropped, and she was once again staring at her lap.

"You won't believe me," she said, and her voice was thick. "All of this, all through everything, I knew you wouldn't believe me, everything and everyone screamed you wouldn't believe me, and all of it, Edward, all of it was for you... I didn't want to get you killed... didn't want your blood on my hands after everything..."

She was talking in circles, and he hated it. _Get to the goddamn point!_

"Tell me, Bella," he said harshly, the words hurting his throat. "Tell me everything, right this instant, or I'm gone."

Again that sound – a cross between a dry gasp and a broken sob, and then his wife's body jack-knifed in the chair, one of her arms straining under her breasts as if seeking to physically hold herself together, the other burying itself in her hair and tugging. She rocked back and forth, gasping, hiccupping, dry-retching, crying without tears, and he was terrified, ice-cold fingers of fear dragging slowly down his spine.

He could resist no longer – could not be cold or unfeeling or uninvolved while she wept like this.

"Bella." One of his hands reached out and cautiously unwound her hair from her fist, smoothing it into place. She sobbed harder.

"Bella, please..." And then, like Rosalie before him, he was folding his long body down to crouch at her eye level. His hand slid to the base of her neck. She raised sad eyes and brokenly looked at him, and then somehow her face was buried in his shoulder and he had her on his lap, one hand stroking circles between her shoulder blades, the other holding her tightly to him, clutching at her like he'd never let her go.

She cried, and cried, and cried, her body convulsing, his arms squeezing her rhythmically. He brushed kisses against her hair and murmured soothingly into her ear, and inwardly, despite the situation, he couldn't help but rejoice. For Bella had cried like this before, cried with her whole body – and she'd refused to let him comfort her. Refused to let him in.

He could hear his family, frozen like statutes in the background – their thoughts and musings and opinions and grievances swirling through his brain like oil through water. Exhausted, he let them settle, not at the top of his mind but at the bottom – murky silt that he knew would ultimately be stirred up. Right now, he needed to concentrate on Bella – on the woman who was not quite his wife, but not quite not, either – and try to undo some of the mistakes he'd made, the damage he'd done.

Eventually, her sobs quietened, her body going slack as if exhausted. He wondered if it was hitting her, then, that there was no such thing as rest for her anymore – no brief respite from the world.

"Edward." He felt her lips buzz against his skin.

He stroked her hair. "Yes, love?"

She drew back slightly, and her terrified eyes met his.

"I don't _want_ to remember," she admitted, and he heard the distinction and ached.

His fingers cupped her cheek, his thumb stroking back and forth underneath her eye.

He didn't say what he felt, what his insides screamed – how she _had_ to remember, _had_ to tell him, _had to_, right this instant, right now, or he'd shatter into a million little pieces – but he knew she could read it in his face nonetheless. Knew, because she sighed, crumpled into herself a little more, and then, abruptly, straightened her body and moved so that she faced him directly, still on his lap, their legs interlocked like scissors.

Her hands grasped his own.

"You really need to know this?" she said quietly. He searched her face and saw the resignation there – saw that she didn't need an answer to this question, but was forced to ask it anyway.

He held her gaze. Feeling somehow ashamed, he nodded.

Her mouth opened slightly and her breath sighed out. She squeezed his hands and whispered: "Okay."

-x-x-x-x-

For a few minutes, absolutely nothing happened.

Eyes closed, she clenched her jaw and concentrated, imagining now-silent veins popping out on her forehead, now-dormant pores springing sweat onto her skin.

She could feel the eyes of every person in the room bear down on her head like the force of seven anvils – could feel the weight of expectation placed squarely on her shoulders. And, glancing up at the frozen faces of Rosalie and Emmett, Jasper and Alice, Carlisle and Esme, she knew that this was it – her last chance at redemption. If she failed them now, nothing she did afterwards would rectify it.

She felt the pressure increase so she almost felt dizzy – felt herself falter a little on the tightrope she was walking.

The slightest squeeze of fingers on hers, and her eyes flew up to meet those of her husband. He was frowning a little. The look in his eyes was half-fascinated, half-afraid.

"I'm trying," she said simply, and he relaxed slightly, nodded once.

She closed her eyes and tried again.

There was a solid mass in her brain, one she'd been tiptoeing around for days, one she'd been guarding, jealously, so as not to disturb it one iota. She'd both known and not known that going anywhere near that invisible barrier would lead her irrevocably away from one road and down another. Though she wasn't altogether comfortable with the road she was on, the pure, blinding terror of _not knowing_ what the other contained had been enough to keep her from trying.

She could do it, though. For Edward.

Because despite her best efforts, she could not completely ignore what she'd done to him. Despite her studied ignorance, still she saw how he flinched every time she moved too suddenly or spoke too sharply, almost as if he expected her to strike him.

Of course, she reminded herself, there were other, more powerful methods of rejection – and she could see that she'd used them all, in the way that he would push her just so far and then retreat, terrified, expecting her each time to leave and never come back.

She couldn't imagine the amount of bravery it must take to just sit opposite her. She couldn't remember all that had passed between them and right now she considered that a blessing – because had she recalled the tiny sordid details of their marriage up to now, she would probably have sought to protect him from herself. She would probably never have come back.

As it stood, she didn't know who she was or where she had come from or why she had ended up here, of all places. She couldn't remember the novels she'd read or the films she'd seen, or the countries she'd travelled to other than Italy. She didn't know what her favourite colour was and she couldn't recall what her mother's face looked like.

But she knew that she would fight for the man sitting so close to her, fight till she dropped. Fight for him, and with him, and against him – anything to make him stay.

The knowledge drew her spine straight, steadied her hands and made her try again.

She pushed against that indescribable _thing_ that she could feel curling malevolently against her skullcap. Pushed until the breath she didn't need huffed from her lungs in pants – until her limbs shook with effort.

She bowed her head slightly, wanting to scream and wail and throw things. Wanting, maybe, more than anything, to say _I can't do this. Please don't make me do this. Please, it's too hard, I'll do anything else you want, anything at all, just please, not this..._

One glance upwards solidified her resolve. Edward's face was frozen in a politely indifferent mask, but she could see a small muscle jumping in his jaw, could see the itching patience lurking behind his careful eyes.

She couldn't make him wait any longer.

Exhausted, she spoke to the wall in her mind – convinced of her own madness, but willing to try anything at this point. She coaxed it, enticed it, tickled at it.

And then she felt it – a tiny quiver. A fault line opening up.

She ignored it for a few short seconds, then redoubled her efforts, and felt the previously solid mass begin to ooze. A few minutes more and it seemed to bubble, then dissolve into a mist, and now she could make out vague shapes and colours through the haze.

Cloudy as they were, the images flickering through her brain already terrified her, and she tightened her grip on Edward's hands.

She heard his confused voice. "Bella, what..."

And then his head whipped around and he was squeezing her hand. She opened her eyes and somehow registered his taut face as it surveyed the couples behind them.

He turned back to her. "I can't hear them," he whispered, shocked. "I can' t hear their thoughts at all. Bella, what are you – what have you – what..."

And then everything crested. The mist dissipated and the knowledge that she'd denied for so long crashed over her head, knocking her backwards, knocking her breathless.

Her mouth opened in a silent cry, and somehow her eyes seized Edward's, and he looked as she felt, and she knew – she knew now that he'd seen, more clearly than she could ever tell her, that he knew, and understood, or would eventually understand, and that now there was no going back.

-x-x-x-x-

*ducks and runs*

I know, I know... Questions will be answered in next chapter. And next. And next.

Please review. x


	18. Chapter 17: Future

First of all, love and many thanks to my pre-readers this week: anaismark, silver sniper of night, What'sMyNomDePlume, kidmomx4 and, as always, addicttwilight2.

I am terribly, terribly nervous about posting this, because your reaction to the next few chapters – which incidentally are probably also going to be the last few chapters – will really tell me whether or not I've done my job properly. Eep.

Bit of an A/N to follow, apologies...

First of all, though it doesn't really come into play yet, I'd like to mention that in my little world Bella's pregnancy was very different from the pregnancy as portrayed in BD. I always found it unrealistic that a woman's body could carry a foetus so obviously alien to full term, so my Bella's pregnancy will be more 'normal'. Again this will be more important a bit later on.

Secondly, my Bella's shield functions a little differently than that of canon Bella. If I'm remembering correctly, in canon, the shield never impeded objects – that's to say, someone outside the shield could still physically touch someone within it. As you'll see, I've changed it a little.

Thirdly, the poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot is alluded to therein – the lines I've used are obviously not mine. Neither is the line "the image blazing and the edges gilded", which is a quote from "Love", by Eavan Boland. Not mine, not mine, not mine. Equally so, Twilight itself is still not mine.

Think I've covered about everything... thanks to all who're still reading. Here we go...

-x-x-x-x-

There are no futures to be told, although,

Because I love you more than I can say,

If I could tell you I would let you know.

"If I Could Tell You", W.H. Auden

-x-x-x-x-

_Please, please, please work. Please, please, please be good enough, please let me be good enough, please make him understand, please, I'll do anything, don't let me lose him now..._

For the first time ever, the voice of her thoughts murmured quietly in his head, and the shock of that was so overwhelming that he sucked in a gasp of air. For a minute, he was reeling, the world in complete confusion around him, his wife biting her lip, furrowing her brow, squeezing his hand so hard it nearly hurt.

Then the full extent of what she was doing hit him, and he sucked in another shallow breath. Bella's eyes shot open, and when they met his they were somehow both black with despair and fierce with love.

His family, still static behind him, faded away. His surroundings, his memories, his independent thoughts – everything vanished. In those minutes, sitting there, he imagined that the room had two chairs and nothing else. His mind had trained a floodlight on Bella and he could do nothing else but sit, watch and listen, and wait for the overwhelming question to be finally answered.

Then the images started reeling through his brain as they reeled through hers. He concentrated fiercely, shutting his eyes so as not to miss a single thing.

She was remembering their honeymoon. Everything was light and happy, their little hotel room full of joy as she revelled in her husband, in their marriage. He closed his eyes as memories of sunny days and starry nights flowed through him – his smiling face everywhere she looked, bright rays of sunshine lancing through the white canopy cocooned around their bed, igniting them both with warmth, making them shine. They'd stayed indoors during the day and ventured out at night, when the heat from the sidewalks of the Champs-Élysées blew into their faces long after the sun had set.

He swallowed, hard, as Bella lingered wistfully on the memory of their evening return to Forks from Paris. The sudden shock of surprise, sleepiness and the ennui of travel fading away as his mother gleefully revealed the cottage that was to be their marital home. The way Bella had shrieked when he'd whisked her into his arms to carry her over the threshold – the way their family had tactfully disappeared.

Afterwards, she'd wrapped a sheet around herself and opened the patio door to discover a tiny garden, and he smiled wistfully as a series of sensory images were recalled in quick succession – the inverted moon in the tiny pond, the musical chirp of crickets, the single strawberry she'd snatched straight from the plant somehow both sweet and tart on her tongue, then on his as he tasted it from her mouth.

He wanted nothing more than to sink into these memories and never resurface, and he knew that Bella did, too – but they both knew that there lingered over that remembered time a sense of foreboding as she contrasted what she'd felt then with what she knew to be true now. Bella observed, quietly and bitterly, that the knowledge she had regained tainted everything – her past, her present, her future.

She took a deep breath, and the previously smooth track of her mental thoughts turned bumpy and uneven. It was times like these that made him wonder whether he, too, was an empath, because he could feel the sick sense of dread surfacing in her stomach as surely as if it was his own.

_Should I, after tea and cakes and ices, _

_Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?_

An irrational rage gripped him. He clenched his fists, battling to keep the words he longed to let fly to himself – battling not to scream at her about how T.S. Eliot had known nothing about the true scope of human misery, not to shake and shake her until the truth fell out.

She opened her eyes then, and he saw his own face from her thoughts – the hard line of his mouth, the subtle quiver of his jaw. He didn't bother to open his eyes, though he knew she wished he would.

_In short, Edward... I am afraid. Oh, I am afraid._

Through all of this, the river of _please, please_ ran steadily, sometimes bubbling over, sometimes barely trickling, but always, always there, permeating her every thought. He was doing his best to ignore it. It wasn't that he didn't care – rather that he couldn't concentrate on anything else while his wife begged like that.

"Just tell me." His voice was tight and barely recognisable, even to himself. "Just do it, Bella. Quick and clean, like... like ripping off a Band-Aid."

He couldn't focus on what this was doing to her, couldn't focus on his own quiet acknowledgement that in this moment, his wife was the bravest woman he'd ever met, because things were happening quickly now. She took a deep breath, set her shoulders, and began.

Bella, waving goodbye from the door of their little home as he jogged across the lawn to join his parents and siblings, all gathered for a prolonged hunting trip. Bella jokingly shielding her eyes as the late afternoon sun threw shimmers off their family's skin. Bella smiling wistfully, her hand pressed to her lips as she remembered his kiss goodbye.

Briefly, his wife struggled for words. During that split second when his mind was once more his own, he thought there was something familiar about that image, something tangible and beloved that was failing to come to him. He could see that scene – his own, true memory of his wife's farewell – in his mind's eye, the image blazing and the edges gilded, but he couldn't figured out why out of all the times he'd kissed her goodbye, that was so important...

And then it came to him. That brief embrace, that kiss before hunting, _bon appétit_ and _see you soon_ and _I'll miss you_ all in one, had been the last moment of normalcy in their marriage – the last touch that Bella had either initiated or willingly accepted, the last true smile he had seen on her lips.

Bella seemed to be waiting for him now, and finally, he met her eyes. They were black and fearful and full of pain, and he could feel the silent warnings they were screaming at him. He nodded his head the tiniest amount, bracing himself.

Bella, leaving their home, having dinner with her father. Bella going grocery shopping, meandering through the aisles, and stopping, very suddenly, in front of a whole rack of feminine hygiene products.

Bella's blood turning to ice. Bella counting rapidly in her head, under her breath. Bella picking up a small yellow box, paying for it. The long journey home, _could it be? Could I be pregnant? _

Bella taking the test, waiting anxiously for the three minutes to be up. And then the slow warmth as it rose through her veins, the bubbling joy infused with disbelief. The feeling, as she spanned both hands over her flat abdomen, of possession – and possessiveness.

Bella dialling his cell, moaning in frustration when it went straight to voicemail... Bella grabbing for her keys, determined to find him, to tell him, hoping that the decision would be enough for Alice to see that she was coming...

Bella finding a note half-concealed under the welcome mat. Angela's handwriting, but shakier than usual – tearstains blotting the words she'd used to tell her friend that she and Ben had broken up.

Bella, sighing, but immediately dropping her purse, shrugging into her coat, locking the door of their home behind her.

Bella taking a short-cut through the woods behind their cottage, halfway to the Webbers', and...

A large _thud_, Esme shrieking in shock.

_He was Bella, in the forest, and he was surrounded by black cloaks and red eyes and white claws, and god, they were everywhere, everywhere he looked he saw more and more, bathed in moonlight, coming out from behind the trees like the demons they were..._

He couldn't breathe – he couldn't think.

"Stop!" he yelled, pressing his hands over his ears childishly – as if that could stem the flow of her invading thoughts. "_Stop_ it!"

And quite suddenly – silence. Complete and total silence.

He opened his eyes, cautiously lowered his hands. Dimly he realised that he'd flown across the room, his back hitting the opposite wall with such force that piece of plaster had fallen off in chunks.

Some of the shock was wearing off now, and he suddenly realised that the frenzied snarls echoing through the space were emanating from his own chest.

Abruptly he quieted himself and straightened up from where he'd been crouched in the corner, ignoring the screaming protest of muscles longing to lock his body down tight and keep it safe. He could almost feel the ghost of a living heart; he imagined it pounding furiously in his chest as his dead glands flooded his body with adrenaline.

"Edward..."

Bella was standing now, her eyes imploring, her hand reaching towards him. He cringed against the wall as though she'd personally beaten him around the head with the revelation – and he supposed, in a way, she had.

He was shivering, his teeth chattering, his every nerve ending crackling with anxiety, his body bowing under the weight of that knowledge, and he didn't think, he couldn't, he...

"Ms. Swan." Carlisle's voice was steely. "Please allow me get to my son."

Abruptly a veil lifted and he was flooded with their thoughts, all of them, Jasper's struggle to calm him, Carlisle and Esme's terror, their anguish at seeing what he'd been reduced to these past few minutes, Alice's never-ending frustration, and...

He was crouching again, shaking harder than ever. His eyes skittered around the room, landed on his wife.

"Make it stop," he pleaded with her. "Stop it, please make it stop."

And suddenly, mercifully, all was silence again, and now he could pull his thoughts together enough to realise that his father's hand was outstretched towards him, the muscles and tendons flexing, fingers moving, but not actually making contact.

Carlisle uttered a word that Edward had never heard him use in all their years as father and son, and, standing, caught hold of the nearest object – a small coffee table – and sent it soaring, straight through the nearest window.

His father turned wild eyes towards Bella, and what he might have said then could have ruined everything, had Rosalie not intervened.

Darting across the room, she placed a placating hand on Carlisle's shoulder, which was now shaking almost as much as Edward's. "Dad. Have a little faith," she said, and that was the first time she'd ever in any way referred to Carlisle as her father.

Carlisle crossed his arms, his jaw tense.

"It seems as though your shield is more powerful than any of us could have imagined, Isabella," he bit out. She made no reply.

In the prolonged silence, Edward found space in his brain. Neatly, over the course of a few minutes, he managed to compartmentalise the information she'd just given him – if not completely, then just enough to allow him to stand, and speak, and appear normal.

With care, he managed not to look at anybody or anything in particular, but he addressed his wife.

"I don't think I can delay hunting any longer. Bella, I would be very grateful if you would join me."

He tried to force himself to look into Carlisle's eyes, but failed and instead addressed his left ear. "I promise that I – that we will explain all of this to you with time," he said softly, trying not to choke on words, trying not to ask aloud how he could possibly explain when he didn't understand himself. "I ask for your continued patience."

He couldn't be sure, since he was currently studying the sun-bleached Monet print on the wall as though it held the very answer to life itself, but he thought he saw Rosalie and Emmett usher the rest of the family out of the room, leaving he and Bella alone.

He turned his back to her and walked away. He knew she'd follow.

-x-x-x-x-

They'd been running for what felt to her like forever, though her cursedly intelligent brain refused to let her away with over-reaching statements like that. She knew that they'd left their little town behind some thirteen hours ago and had since covered over four thousand kilometres, cutting an almost-silent path across the midland states, open Montana skies giving way to a blurry Chicago skyline on the horizon. She had no idea where they were going, but that didn't matter – she was content to follow as he led.

They swept through endless rolling fields, keeping off the main routes, sometimes racing down tiny pathways that were the very epitome of _the road not taken_, sometimes effortlessly finding their way through sections of forest thick and dense with twisted undergrowth. Always they kept just far enough away from the cities, moving faster than the human eye could see – for though Edward was undoubtedly still the fastest vampire Bella had ever met, she herself was still fuelled by her own human blood and could easily keep pace with him.

Somewhere between Sioux Falls and Cedar Rapids she had shortened the length of her strides infinitesimally, waiting to see if Edward would do likewise, determined that if he matched her decreased speed she would ask him to stop and talk.

He'd continued, the set of his shoulders firm, his face never changing one inch, his jaw set and strong, and she'd sighed a little and kept going.

They were moving so quickly and taking such isolated trails that Bella had retracted her shield, hoping that they would somehow manage to avoid close contact with humans – for her sake as well as Edward's. At one point, however, they came upon a section of wood that was so tightly packed with vegetation that they were forced to reduce their speed just enough so they could zigzag comfortably around the trees. Consequently, they meandered just a little too close to a little farmhouse, whose lights were just tiny pinpricks, even to Bella's eyes.

Edward stumbled then, just enough that she noticed, affronted as he was by human thought. Her reaction was immediate. Cutting off her own sense of smell, she threw her newfound power over him with such force that he stopped dead for the first time since they'd left the house, unable to move past the invisible buffer protecting him from every obstacle in his path.

He turned to glare at her then, and she shrank back from his ferocity.

"Stop trying to protect me, Bella," he ground out. Duly chastened, she retreated and they flew onwards once again.

They were nearing Chicago now, passing nearer and nearer to human habitation. She was a little worried about what might happen if they reached the city without having slaked their bloodlust, and cleared her throat several times, wanting to say as much to Edward. Each time she tried, she shut her mouth just before the words came out, and each time Prufrock's lament rang hollowly in her head like the tolling of funeral bells. _This is not what I meant at all_, she thought sadly, watching her husband as he ran as though the hounds of hell were on his heels.

Still, she reflected, he'd asked for her company, asked that she come with him and run beside him, and that had to count for something... he hadn't sent her away... but that was little comfort, he still didn't know everything...

A low-hanging branch affronted itself in her path so suddenly that she almost ran straight into it. Blinking as one roused from a trance, she realised that they'd veered off the almost-straight line they'd cut through the country – that they were once again flying through a forest like a pair of white ghosts.

Edward hissed beside her, and with no further preamble he sprang from the packed earth with such grace that her breath caught in her throat. He grabbed onto the low-lying limb of a tree and suddenly he was gone, out of her field of vision.

She stopped and waited. Barely twenty seconds later, two bodies fell to earth.

She had to admire Edward's efficiency. The cat had not even the chance to squeal. Edward's teeth sank swiftly and powerfully through the mass of corded muscle at its throat, and he drank.

She stood as though turned to stone, and as she watched him she felt the stirrings of her own hunger. That he was here with her, that he was willingly allowing her to watch as he engaged in this most carnal of acts stirred something unfamiliar within her, something vital and wild. If she'd had a heart, it would have been pattering a frantic rhythm against her breastbone.

Then she realised that the feelings witnessing such an act evoked within her were absolutely pointless. She could see Edward's face, see his eyes as he fed, and she could see that he took absolutely no pleasure in the act, that he gained no real relief.

He finished, stood, turned, and without a word he shot into the trees like a bullet from a gun. She sighed and followed.

-x-x-x-x-

Her newborn thirst had been harder to satisfy than she'd anticipated, but still she'd gained more succour from the experience than her husband had. If nothing else, the work of tracking, chasing, killing and finally burying her prey served to calm her somewhat, her mind and hands working fluidly towards a common goal. There was nothing particularly complicated about her task and for that she was uncommonly grateful.

Standing from the mound of newly-dug earth, she dusted herself off briskly and looked around for Edward.

He was leaning against a dead oak tree a few metres to her left. His back was to her, his left shoulder propping the rest of his body up, and he was absolutely still. As she watched, a few slimy, diseased leaves dropped from the branch directly above him and landed neatly in his thatch of hair. He made no move to wipe them away.

As though he knew she had finished and was watching him, he called out to her in a deceptively calm voice.

"Have you had enough?"

She murmured a quiet yes.

"Good." He had not moved one jot, but somehow the lines of his body seemed to solidify, as though he were bracing himself against something. "We have some things to discuss, I think."

"You think?" she asked sarcastically. When he didn't respond, she allowed a thread of thought to peek through the shield around her mind, envisaging it flying across the space between them.

_Please talk to me._

With that he whirled around, and she gasped. Though he had gorged himself on the blood of animals, his eyes were still black with an entirely different hunger.

"I'll talk to you, Bella," he said, and his voice was both angry and pleading, "but like this. You and me, speaking. A _conversation_. I can't... I can't..."

He broke off and lowered his gaze, his entire body shuddering. He paced a few feet towards her, then a few feet back. Finally he seemed to summon up the courage and came to rest right in front of her, close enough to touch.

"For the first time since I met you, I do not wish to know your thoughts," he admitted quietly, as though ashamed. "In fact... I can't, Bella, I can't hear about it like that. I'm sorry."

She wanted so much to reach across the space between him and touch his hand – to tell him that he was the bravest man she'd ever met, other than Jacob – but she sensed that anything like that might just break him apart.

"It's okay," she said quietly, and tried her best to inject her voice with warmth. Anything to support him, to make it easier for him. Anything for him.

He took a deep breath and looked her straight in the eye.

"You were pregnant."

She licked her lips, her hand rising to ghost along her stomach. "Yes."

"With my baby." He said it as a statement, and not a question, but still she felt the implicit sting.

"Yes."

She could hear his breath rattling through his chest –could almost feel the effort it must have taken him to utter every word.

"And they – the Volturi – they came..."

She kept eye contact, willing him to understand, to know... "Yes."

His fists were clenched, knuckles straining white. "Why?" he asked, and his voice was shaking now.

Her thumb stroked over the place on her skin where her wedding band had once sat.

"They said we'd had enough time." Her voice was dead, emotionless. She was fighting with all her might to not get sucked back into that moment, that sense of helplessness, of danger all around.

All the power had gone out of his voice. "They were going to kill you," he whispered. She jerked her head upwards, somehow surprised, despite herself, that he was still here, still trying to figure this out.

"No," she admitted. "No, I was too _interesting_ for that. They were going to take me. To Volterra. Just leave the door of our home wide open, swinging in the wind – maybe spill some of my blood around to be sure you wouldn't follow. And Aro wasted no time in telling me that if you turned up asking for execution again, he'd make sure I had a front-row seat."

He was watching her as though transfixed to the forest floor. He looked so much as if he was carved by stone then that she was almost surprised when his lips moved.

"How did you get out of there?" he asked, a strange sense of fascination colouring his voice.

She licked her lips. "I told them I was pregnant."

Edward stared at her as though she'd suddenly grown another head. "But – but that would've –"

"Would have made them want me even more." She finished the phrase for him, then shrugged her shoulders. "It did. It was stupid of me... I panicked."

His brow was furrowed. "So then – after that – how did you..."

She interrupted – something she'd vowed she wouldn't do, but the story was crawling under her skin now, and she thought she'd rip her flesh from her bones if she had to go one more minute without telling it.

"Edward," she said firmly, meeting his eyes with all the force, all the love she could muster. "Edward – I told them it was Jacob's."

-x-x-x-x-

Thanks for reading – please review.


	19. Chapter 18: Loss

Massive A/N ahead – you have been warned.

First of all, allow me to apologise for the delay with this. I'm working as an au pair at the moment and taking care of a young child while simultaneously running a house does not allow much time for writing. As well as this my internet connection is VERY sketchy and will be for the next few weeks, so I anticipate another delay with the next chapter... again, I am so sorry, but there's really nothing I can do. We're almost finished, anyway, and once I get back to updating regularly there'll only be three or four chapters to go.

Second of all, I neglected to mention last chapter that the fabulous silversniperofnight was kind enough to interview me for her blog, which can be found at www (dot) sytycw (dot) blogspot (dot) com. Keep an eye on it if anyone is interested to see how I much babble in real time. ;)

Third of all, this chapter is one of the longest I've ever written. It was exhausting to write, and so I anticipate that it will also be exhausting to read... I've had no pre-readers on this one because of the internet thing, so my knees are knocking as I– I hope the answers contained herein were worth the wait.

Fourth of all, I feel like I've reached a turning point here, and so major props are in order this time round. As usual to addicttwilight2 and anaismark, who are my faithful cheerleaders and whip-snappers, along with Beautiful_Distraction who is quite simply the most encouraging validation beta to ever exist . Also to whatsmynomdeplume and silversniperofnight who have single-handedly (should that be double-handedly?) sent more people my way in the past two months than have stumbled by all year. Also to kidmomx4, a_muse1, AndraLee, icrodriguez and SO MANY MORE who have provided constant encouragement throughout the posting of this story – if it wasn't for you guys I would never have gotten this far.

Fifth of all... all standard disclaimers apply. Characters aren't mine, but the plotline is.

That's all folks.

-x-x-x-x-

Now I have lost my loss

In some way I may later understand.

I hear the singing of the summer grass

And love, I find, has no considered end,

Nor is it subject to the wilderness

Which follows death...

"Into the Hour" – Elizabeth Jennings

-x-x-x-x-

He hadn't planned it like this – hadn't planned much of anything, in fact. He'd felt the need to run, to feel the power of his body pushing him forward – as if his physical strength could somehow buoy him for the battle ahead – and in truth he'd had no real direction in mind.

It was funny, he thought, that unconsciously he'd led them almost straight to the city and the house he'd been born in. Equally so it was funny that the place he'd chosen to hunt – the place where her story was unravelling – was so thick and dense and wild. It had almost, _almost_ been difficult for them to hunt in, and it felt appropriate in a way that their meadow never would have. That was a place for open love, fearless joy – this felt like a place for secrets.

He hadn't spoken in a while, choosing instead to focus all his energy on calming his body. Every time he thought he'd finally gotten used to being around his wife again, something else came along to knock him head over heels. His muscles were constantly bunched, ready to bolt at a second's notice, his body revolting against staying somewhere with so much danger, and it was only by extreme force of will that he could continue to stand in front of her at all. To her credit, she waited for him – but then again, maybe that was only appropriate. He'd waited for her.

He closed his eyes and blew a long breath from his lungs. He could sense her eyes on him, warm trails moving across his face, and he didn't have to look at her to know how scared she was.

"You told them that it was the dog's," he said calmly, eyes closed.

"Don't call him that." Her voice was low, deadly. When he opened his eyes and looked at her, he was surprised at how far away she appeared, though she stood perfectly still in front of him. How the more he knew of her, the more she seemed like a stranger.

He could see no end to this mess, and he was tired, so tired. He just wanted it to be over. He remembered how easy things had been between them once – remembered the constant to-and-fro of conversation, the look of devotion in her eyes, the unsullied brilliance of her smile. He ached to get that back, to once more reach a place of ease and hope with his wife, but the journey there was so hard, and he was weary down to his bones.

He couldn't be considerate, or caring – couldn't pretend that he wasn't a jerk, wasn't a monster right now. Because he loved her, but he hated her too, and right now the hate was winning. It was taking control over his thoughts, his muscles, forcing him to stand stiffly there, preventing him from giving her comfort, choking the words of love and reassurance he wanted to say.

"What happened, Bella?" His voice was more clinical than it should have been. The hate broiling in him wouldn't allow him to show any weakness.

He heard the air shift around her before he saw her move. Slowly, surely she stepped back to rest her body against the body of an immense tree. Her hands lay against the trunk, fingers following the flow of the grainy wood, and she stared at the gnarled branches twisting above her head.

"I never, ever expected that you could get me pregnant," she admitted quietly, "and I know you didn't either, but Edward – you would have been happy, right?"

He hadn't expected that, wasn't ready to think of their baby in a concrete sense. Somehow his mind had been able to process the fact that _he'd gotten his wife pregnant_ without thinking _I was going to be a father_ or _I am a father_ or _I could have been a father_. In fact, he realised with a flash of shame that the only time the word _father_ had even entered his mind was when he'd wondered if the child was Jacob's.

He drew breath to speak, and he had no idea what he was going to say – but that was all right, because she interrupted him before he even started.

"I don't know why I asked you that... you would have been happy. I _know_ you would have, because I was ecstatic, and we were just two halves of a whole back then. I was ecstatic, Edward."

He nodded infinitesimally, thinking hard. He would have been worried about her, and a tiny voice whispered that he might have doubted her a little, even then, even with no reason to. But yes – he would have been happy, simply because anything that made Bella describe herself as _ecstatic_ had to be beloved to him also.

She slid slowly down the trunk now, coming to rest between two thick roots, her hands clenching fistfuls of grass and soil. Silently he lowered himself to sit cross-legged opposite her, leaning in to rest his elbows on his knees. She allowed him to crowd her, tipping her head back to stare up once more at the tree's dappled leaves.

He watched the smooth white column of her throat as she swallowed and began again.

"I felt so much in that window of time between me finding out and the Volturi coming – so much hope, so much joy. I imagined me singing our baby to sleep in a rocking chair, both of us leaning over our child's crib to kiss him – I always imagined a boy – goodnight. And beyond all of that, I felt _useful_, Edward. Like I had a purpose, like I could finally give you back some of the happiness you've given me for as long as I've known you... like we would finally be equals as parents."

A few filtered rays of sunlight made their way through the thick foliage, falling across her upturned face, casting diamonds across her cheeks. She closed her eyes against the light, swallowing deeply.

"And then they came, and I knew it would never be a reality." Her forehead creased – he could tell she was trying her hardest to maintain her composure. "I tried to deny it, but that first day my image of a family in a little cottage vanished. I knew it would never happen, but still I had to try – for our son's sake. For yours."

One hand rose from the grass she'd been clutching now, and he watched as it came to rest on the gentle swell of her abdomen now, her fingers stroking back and forth. He wondered whether it was a conscious act of grief for the child she'd once sheltered, or a completely unconscious gesture of tenderness and protection for a child she still imagined to be there. He wasn't sure which would be worse.

"He would have been so beautiful, Edward," she sighed, and her voice was so full of sorrow, so clogged with tears that he had to swallow repeatedly just listening to it. Her use of tense hit him like a clenched fist against his heart. "Our little bronze-haired boy... I always pictured him with your hair and my eyes. Your strength, my impulsiveness, your patience, my stubbornness, your gentleness, your capacity to love and forgive. Half you and half me, Edward. Knowing you've made a baby by loving your husband - it's an indescribable feeling. Loving someone without ever having seen their face, loving them without knowing them... You can't imagine what it was like. I couldn't have imagined what it was like.

"And that's why I told them it was Jacob's. Ironically enough I was trying to protect you and your baby by claiming I'd been unfaithful. And it worked, like I'd suspected it would. They found it... delicious."

She shuddered, a shadow passing over her face.

_Aro's face, gleeful and cruel. "The all-knowing Edward Cullen, cuckolded by a dog and slip of a girl!" The response – the mocking laughter shrilling in her ears, bouncing off the trees around them, the sound magnified further in the small space. Her stomach churning even more, her hands clenched in fists._

He flinched, and she winced. "I'm sorry," she said softly, looking directly at him for the first time since she'd begun, and he shook his head, unable to speak.

"They asked me what I was going to do," she continued determinedly, her eyes holding his, "and I told them that I'd just found out, that I was on the way to tell Jacob – that I would decide after hearing his reaction, but that we were... that we were planning to leave together... that I was planning to leave you.

"They gave me two hours. They had no desire to follow me into Quileute territory – one of the leaders has an overwhelming fear of the Children of the Moon, and besides that they regarded the wolves as little more than ants – not even worth the effort it would take to kill them."

She drew a deep breath, and her eyes finally dropped from his, eyelids drooping slowly as though moving at all was more effort than she could afford.

"So I ran," she said softly, watching her hands. "I took the Volvo and it felt like another betrayal. I drove to Jacob's house and I woke him up and I demanded that he come with me. He put up a fight – initially told me to get the hell of his property, in fact – but I was hysterical enough that he eventually listened. And I lied to him. I told him the Volturi had threatened the pack directly, that I'd begged for their lives, that if he didn't come with me his entire family would be killed... and oh, Edward, they were my family too... I loved them, but I loved you more...

"Eventually he followed me. I demanded that he betray his mate – he'd imprinted on Leah two days before everything – and pretend to still be in love with me, to be proud to be the father of my child, and he did. I demanded that he betray his family, his heritage, and pretend to be ashamed of what he was – pretend to be awed by the vampires, to look up to them and their way of life, even, and gloat in front of them about pulling the wool over your eyes – and he did. I demanded that he risk his life, and he did.

"I took him back to the clearing, and they were still waiting, like they'd done before – none of them had moved a muscle. I was so scared, constantly worrying that I'd vomit or faint, and I knew it was my only chance, my last chance... I didn't know whether Aro would be able to read Jacob's thoughts or not, you see, and I knew if he did we were all going to die, slowly and painfully.

"Jake was so brave – so much braver than I was. He never came close to losing control over his human form, and he never once let go of my hand. Not even when it became painfully clear to him that I'd lied, exaggerated, whatever, to get him to come with me. Not even when he realised that the entire reason for them being there was that I hadn't yet become a leech, as he termed it. And it worked, Edward. Aro couldn't read Jacob's thoughts, and he swore blindly that he was my lover, the father of my son.

"Aro _congratulated_ us. On our child and on _getting away with it_, as he put it. He found it highly ironic – said he'd never known a human to trick a vampire, and especially not one as smart as you... but then he laughed and said that you loved me stupidly, beyond reason. That it made you weak. I think – I think he resented your refusal to join them in Italy more than we realised at the time. I think he resented your confidence, and your arrogance – resented that I was enough for you – and I think it satisfied him mightily to think of how you'd suffer when you found out.

"He asked what our plans were, and Jacob told him that we were going to go to you, together, and explain. And just for a moment, I hoped – I thought we'd get away with it. That I could talk to you, tell you what I'd had to do, and you'd make it better, make it go away like you always did. Jacob could go back to his life, and we could start ours – as a family – and one day we'd tell our son about what happened the night Mommy found out she was pregnant... look back on the memory and shiver, and dismiss it, and go on with our happy lives..."

For the first time, her voice broke, her breath catching on a sob. And her control slipped.

_Aro frowning, lines etching across his papery forehead. "Oh no, Mrs. Cullen," he berated, sounding almost as though he was reprimanding an errant child, the words almost sing-song. "I'm afraid that won't do at all."_

For a split second, he could hear her enormous struggle to control her shield before it finally yielded, snapping back between them. "I'm sorry," she moaned, her hands cupping over her ears as if she could barely bear to hear her own words.

She continued before he could shape the words to tell her _stop saying sorry, you owe me nothing, I deserve so much worse_.

"They wanted _proof_." She spat the word out as though it disgusted her. "Confirmation that we were telling the truth. They told me they were being _lenient,_ that the situation was unorthodox, and stood there and waited till I _thanked_ them for it. And when I'd scraped enough for them, when I'd told them how _grateful_ I was to them for tearing my life apart and dancing on its ashes, they told us that we had precisely seven months to get our affairs in order. That they expected us to present ourselves in Volterra before I gave birth. That they'd make their final judgement then. That they'd be staying in the area, to watch us, to make sure we were what we said we were, and that if they suspected, even slightly, that we were lying, they would kill us and our families. First it would be Jacob who would be killed in front of me, then Charlie, then Carlisle and Esme, your brothers and sisters, and finally you. Aro told me all of this, Edward, and all the time his voice was full of glee. He sounded like a little boy planning a game of tag."

She raised dead eyes and looked at him. "And that was that. I was six weeks pregnant, and alone. Jacob went back to the reservation and told Leah everything, and she moved away for a while to make sure that there was no way she'd run across either you or Aro. He broke from the pack so that nobody would have access to his thoughts, and he bought a little cabin high in the mountains – on the other side of the treaty line, so the tribe were powerless against the vampires they knew were there. I met him there once a week to make sure that whoever was watching thought we were really having an affair. You came home three days after it all, when I'd had a chance to calm down, to think things through... and I started to break your heart."

_Get away from me. Don't touch me. You sicken me, you're so cold. You're dead, for Christ's sake. I'm married to a corpse._

He was shaking, he realised, and he couldn't tell whether that had been his memory or hers.

Her hand twitched as though she wanted to reach out to him.

"Edward," she said desperately, "Edward, that wasn't _me_. I had to kill myself to say those things. You are the person I love most in this world, and I knew I was destroying you, saw it every day, every moment. But Edward, every time, _every single time_ I was destroying myself too. I ached for you, for your voice in my ears and your lips on my skin, and I couldn't have you. You were so close, and so far away.

His entire body was trembling, vibrating with his desire to speak, to scream, to cry. He locked his jaw, refusing to interrupt her. He reminded himself that when you drew poison from a wound, you did it all in one go.

"One time, at the very beginning – oh god, you were in the garden, pruning the roses, and I came home from the grocery store, and I tripped coming up the path and you caught me, and I smiled and thanked you and squeezed your hand. Just lightly, just a small touch – once I would have kissed you... and still, later that night, when you'd left to hunt, someone sent me a picture message of the pair of us standing there smiling at each other with the words _you'll have to do better than that_. They were always, always there, Edward, and nobody knew but me. I have no idea how they did it, no idea how they evaded Alice's visions, all of your heightened senses – but they did it. It was like sleeping in a nest of vipers – I was afraid to breathe.

"I knew I'd have nightmares, so I started taking sleeping tablets. They didn't stop the dreams from coming, but they must have weighed my muscles down because you never mentioned me having night terrors. One day I forgot and the next morning you told me I'd screamed in my sleep. I made up some ridiculous excuse and after that I forced you to let me sleep alone.

"I went to an obstetrician in Seattle when I was twelve weeks pregnant. I was worried that something supernatural would show up in the scan, but it was perfect, Edward. I'd been right – it was a boy. I saw our son's head, his fingers and toes. I heard his heartbeat. And that was the best day of my life in so many ways, because once I'd seen the proof, the actual physical proof that we'd made a baby together, I knew it was worth everything, any sacrifice. I convinced myself that if you knew why I was doing what I was doing, you'd agree. That you'd withstand anything I could throw at you, any pain, any torment, to keep our son safe.

"That was a good day," she admitted, her voice very small. "That... things weren't always so clear. I loved my son, _our_ son, loved him from the first second I realised he existed, but there were times when I hated him. A helpless child, Edward, an unborn baby, and I blamed him for the fact that I was still alive to suffer, to make you suffer... I knew they would have killed me if I hadn't told them I was pregnant, and I blamed him for that. I blamed him for not making me sick in the mornings, for not making my body bloat up like a balloon overnight. I wished he'd had your strength, your skin – that he could have cracked a rib while I slept. Anything so you would realise what was happening."

She lowered her head so her forehead touched her bent knees, her voice muffled. "I blamed you for not realising, even though I knew there was no way you could have. I loved you enough to put us both through hell and back, but I hated you too sometimes – for getting me pregnant in the first place, for loving me so much through everything, for not leaving me, for not letting me push you away. You fought so hard, Edward, and I hated you for it, for making my job harder. I wished they'd killed me. I wished you'd killed me. I was weak, and I wanted to die."

His mind, his heart, his muscles and bones, all of them aching – not a screaming pain, but a soul-deep throbbing that permeated through to the very deepest part of him. His jaw clenched tight, his knuckles straining white, his eyes and ears screaming with the need to close and protect against this assault. _Be still. For the love of god, be still._

As though rebelling against his inner plea, she suddenly unfurled her body and began to pace, her hands going through her hair. He remained seated but scooted his body back, curling into himself. Suddenly, she turned and punched a neat hole straight through the trunk of the tree she'd been leaning against. Her free hand gouged at the wood, huge chunks splintering away from the whole.

He understood why she did it – understood her need to break something that had once been whole, and so feel like something existed in the world that echoed how she felt.

Her two hands rested flat against the maimed trunk, her shoulders shaking and her head dropped. She was crying without sound and without tears, her body heaving violently, and still he could not go to her.

He felt, somehow, as if the only way to survive this was to make himself small and quiet and unnoticeable. To blend and become part of the background. To not question, or interrupt, or fight against what she was saying – just to let her say it, and deal with the raw words when they settled. He felt somehow that if he were to disturb her story with his own accusations, or his memories, or his desperate need to reassure her, they would never leave the forest, and he would never hear the truth.

In any case, his entire body felt chafed and sore, and he could not bear to entertain the thought of even wiggling his toes, let alone standing, and walking, and comforting. Couldn't, or wouldn't – he didn't know. He just didn't know.

An indeterminate amount of time passed. She wept, her body drawn tight, and he clamped down against every instinct that told him to go to her. Everything animate and mobile in the forest had long since fled,aware of the threat that the both of them represented. The air was muggy as it pressed down on him, the fabric of his clothes gathering the moisture from the air, hanging heavily from his frame. He wished for a breath of air, a whisper of wind.

Her sobs were lessening now, he noted in relief, clenching arms that wanted to envelop her and draw her near. She hiccupped wetly twice, her body spasming, and then stilled.

She turned to face him. He was ashamed, but he couldn't manage to look at her face.

She leaned back against the trunk and spoke, and her voice was more dead than he'd ever heard it.

"Of all the things I did and said to you in the four month period between the Volturi coming and me finally leaving, only two things were really _real_. I proved myself to be a damn fine actress with you – I controlled my voice, my breathing, my speech, my heart, my soul and even my desire, but still I was only human, and I slipped twice."

She was watching him, he knew, and he couldn't tell if she took his refusal to meet his eyes as rejection. He knew he would have, and though it wasn't his intention to torture her like that, still he could not force himself to look into her face. He could not see the horrors he heard in her voice there.

"Once was when you snuck up behind me and touched my shoulder," she said quietly, "and once was the night before I left, when I left the bathroom door unlocked and you came into the shower with me. When I cried on your shoulder, and kissed you, and made love with you."

The touch to her shoulder – when she'd flinched away. He wondered if it was the same incident that he himself remembered as the point when he'd realised how deeply their relationship was damaged. It had been halfway through those four months. He realised with a shock that she'd been three months pregnant at the time.

"We had to check in every two weeks with them – an actual face to face meeting with Aro," she said, her voice bitterly amused. "We met in restaurants, in hotels, in bars – always in public places. So he could make sure I was actually pregnant. So he could make sure Jacob and I were still together. Most of all so he could gloat, and taunt.

"He insisted on almost constant physical contact with us. Usually he made us sit beside him and slung his arms over our shoulders. He maintained that he might still someday be able to hear our thoughts, and so all the time I was constantly on edge, waiting for the moment where one of us would slip and everything would come spilling out. Jacob got really, really good at controlling what he thought about – which you saw when he came to see us last week. We planned that too, by the way – I coached him on what to say in the event that we made it back to Forks. Back to you. I needed him to be vague enough that it wouldn't garner much suspicion if we were still being watched, and at the same time I wanted to make sure you knew that I had no choice – especially if I wasn't there to tell you myself.

"It never happened – Aro never got anything from either of us. Jake always told me that it was just another part of the pack's natural defences against our kind, but... oh Edward, I thought – I think it was the baby."

He closed his eyes against the note of fierce pride in her voice as she continued. "I know Alice can't see Jacob anyway, but I think our son strengthened my shield somehow so she couldn't see us even when we were away from Jake, and Jasper couldn't feel us, and Aro couldn't hear us. I don't know if it's true – I guess I'll never know... but I liked to pretend.

"You – when you touched my shoulder like that, just for a second I thought you were _him_ – that Aro had come into our bedroom to taunt me some more... and I flinched, and you were hurt, and I said sorry. Do you remember? It was the only time I ever said sorry to you."

Yes, he remembered – and yes, it was the same incident that had stood out in his mind. He didn't know how that made him feel – that he'd somehow known, even then, even given her treatment of him, that her recoiling from him so violently was beyond the pale.

He had gone so long without speaking, without breathing that a fine layer of dust lay over his lips and lined his nasal passages. He cleared his throat, then coughed to clear it.

"What about the other time?" he whispered. His voice was cracked and dry. He braced himself for the answer – because of all the things she'd done, making love to him just before she left had been the worst. For a brief shining moment he'd believed that they could work things out, and then it had been snatched away – and he'd fallen even harder than he might have otherwise.

It had felt sadistic at the time, and even knowing her probable reasons, he didn't know if he could ever forgive her for that – even begin to forgive her.

"Edward, please look at me." Her request was quiet and defeated – she didn't expect him even to try, and that knowledge wrecked him.

He raised his head, struggling, and finally rested his gaze on her mouth. He noted that she'd bitten her lip so hard it was oozing venom slowly. _That must have stung_, he thought dully.

"That week, I told you I was spending two nights with my father, when really I was going to Seattle with Jacob to meet Aro again. I was tired – being pregnant was starting to take its toll physically, and I wanted to sleep between meeting him and coming back to you. I knew the deadline was approaching: I had to leave soon, and I wanted to start preparing myself."

She took a deep breath. He dropped his eyes from her mouth and focused instead on how her body was braced, ramrod straight and proud above him.

"It was a good thing in the end that I did," she admitted quietly, "because... because... oh Edward..."

She broke off, her hands coming up to cover her forehead. Her body rocked slightly, back and forth. _I can't, I can't, I can't_...

"Take a deep breath," he said carefully, not wanting to push her, but needing to know.

Her shoulders straightened out, her hands dropping to her sides. He swallowed deeply as his wife faced him, her shoulders down, her body open and vulnerable.

He took a deep breath, and finally looked at her face. A low groan built in his chest as he registered her expression: sadness and pain and loss and fierce, fierce love, and bitter relief at this finally being said.

"I snapped," she told him sadly. "I wasn't strong enough after all. I told Aro – I told him that I couldn't betray you, couldn't go through with it, couldn't leave you."

"_But my dear, you've already betrayed him." His voice was mocking, or maybe that was just her imagination. "You've created a child with another man. What could possibly be worse?"_

"I told him I didn't want to leave my family behind. That I wanted to pass my baby off as yours and stay with you. That I felt guilty about taking advantage of your trust. That Jacob wasn't ready to be a father, that we'd started fighting. I told him everything and anything I thought would stop him.

"We were sitting upstairs in a crowded bar, and arguing in whispers. Not even arguing – I was pleading and crying and begging and he was laughing, Edward, sitting there chuckling like some indulgent uncle... but eventually he got tired of it and stood up to go.

He had to move at a human pace, you know, because of course we were in public – and I got up from my chair to follow him. Jacob tried to hold me back, but I wouldn't listen. I followed him, and..."

She broke off suddenly, her face creasing into a look of such intense pain that Edward felt it echo in his gut.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I can't," she said, babbling feverishly now. "I thought I could, but I can't, and you have to see, Edward, you have to –"

And suddenly he _was_ her, submerged so utterly in this memory that her hands as they reached towards a man in a dark tweed jacket were his, her voice his as it pleaded, as it cried Aro's name, her nails his as they scrabbled ineffectually at the vampire's back. So he watched Aro turn, too sharply, through eyes that were his but not his, and he felt something he could never remember experiencing himself – vertigo. Ah, he realised, even as his body – his and hers – overbalanced and fell, he'd been standing at the top of a flight of stairs... He heard Jacob's voice yell his wife's name through the blood pounding through his ears, saw Aro's eyes widen, the ghost of his smirk the last thing his eyes caught as he fell down, down.

And she twisted her body, though she knew it was useless, that it was already too late – still she twisted her body to protect his son, and he felt his wife's arms going around the soft precious bump of pregnancy one last time, as if her frail bones were enough to protect it against the dirty concrete floor rushing too fast towards him – much too fast.

Something hit his head and knocked him silly. The last thing he saw before the dark closed in was his own face, smiling down at him – at _her_ – the face she loved most in the world, smiling at her sadly. And his loss was her loss.

Her shield came crashing down, and his mind and body was his own again. He gasped for air, groaned, the act of breathing searing holes through his lungs.

Then, finally, he was moving, his muscles releasing, his body unbending. His feet stumbled drunkenly towards her, and her breathing froze. She backed so she was pressed fully against the tree, and he knew by the way her body was set that she was expecting him to shake her, hit her even, expecting him to try and break her even more.

As tenderly as he was able, he raised his shaking hands and cupped her cheeks between his two palms.

"Bella," he sobbed. "Oh, Bella."

Her mouth had half-opened at the first touch of his skin on hers. She clutched his fingers almost desperately, her grief emerging from her throat in hoarse cries.

He manoeuvred them so his back was to the wood of the tree that had supported her, and sunk down with her, cradling her small form on his lap, gathering her close. They rocked back and forth together. Her hands clung to him, moving restlessly through his hair, over his face, down past his shoulders to hold onto his shoulder-blades.

Bitterly he remembered that this was precisely what she'd done that last time they'd made love, when she'd stopped fighting him, stopped crying and screaming – remembered her heat wrapping round him as her soft fingers grabbed whatever she could of him and kept him near, her skin sliding against his under the spray of the shower.

At the time he'd surmised that she was as desperate for him as he'd been for her; now he knew precisely what had caused her to latch on to him as if she'd never let him go, what had caused her eyes to squeeze out tears even as she shuddered in pleasure. And as last time, his lips kissed every particle of her skin they could reach. Her forehead. Her eyelids. The space behind her ear. He'd meant it as a prayer of thankfulness then. Now, with the realisation of their shared loss blazing through him, he meant it as thankfulness, but also as comfort, as empathy, as finally understanding.

"Our baby, our baby, we lost our baby," he moaned into the silk of her hair, and her hands clutched him closer in response, her voice howling with his, caught in the maelstrom of grief and loss for a child neither of them had ever known or would ever know.

They clung to each other for a long time after that, crying and shaking, bodies intertwined. Her fingers laced around his neck, one of his arms tight around her back, his other hand between them, resting against the skin that had sheltered his son.

When night fell, he drew a shuddering breath and rearranged her so her cheek lay between his shoulder blades, her arms and legs wrapped firmly around him. One of her hands lay over his heart as he started to run.

When she finally spoke, her voice was heavy with exhaustion. "Where are we going, Edward?"

He gave her the only answer he could find. "Home, love," he said simply. "We're going home."

-x-x-x-x-

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